The Book of Job (Text of The Hebrew Bible S)

THE BOOK OF JOB
The Text of the Hebrew Bible, 1

Series Editor
David J.A. Clines
THE BOOK OF JOB
John Gray
Edited by David J.A. Clines
SHEFFIELD PHOENIX PRESS

2010
Copyright 2010 Sheffield Phoenix Press

Published by Sheffield Phoenix Press
Department of Biblical Studies, University of Sheffield
45 Victoria Street, Sheffield S3 7QB
www.sheffieldphoenix.com
All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information
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A CIP catalogue record for this book

is available from the British Library
Typeset by Forthcoming Publications
Printed by Lightning Source
ISBN 978-1-905048-02-1
ISSN 1747-9622
CONTENTS
Preface
Abbreviations
ix
x
Part I
GENERAL INTRODUCTION
Chapter 1
INTRODUCTION
Chapter 2
JOB IN THE CONTEXT OF NEAR EASTERN WISDOM LITERATURE
Chapter 3
JOB IN HEBREW WISDOM
21
Chapter 4
DATE AND PROVENANCE
32
Chapter 5
LITERARY FORMS IN THE BOOK OF JOB
39
Chapter 6
THE COMPOSITION OF THE BOOK OF JOB
56
Chapter 7
TEXT AND VERSIONS
76
Chapter 8
THE LANGUAGE OF THE BOOK OF JOB
93
Chapter 9
THE ARGUMENT
108
Part II
COMMENTARY
Job 1 and 2
THE PROLOGUE
119
Job 3
JOBS EXPOSTULATION
138
vi
The Book of Job
Job 4 and 5
ELIPHAZS FIRST ADDRESS
148
Job 6 and 7
JOBS FIRST REJOINDER TO ELIPHAZ (CHAPTER 6)
AND HIS EXPOSTULATION WITH GOD (CHAPTER 7)
167
Job 8
BILDADS FIRST EXPOSTULATION
183
Job 9 and 10
JOBS SECOND REJOINDER
190
Job 11
ZOPHARS FIRST ADDRESS
206
Job 1214
JOBS STATEMENT
213
Job 15
ELIPHAZS SECOND REPLY: A REMONSTRATION
TO JOBS OBSTINACY IN QUESTIONING THE THEODICY
235
Job 16 and 17
JOBS REJOINDER TO ELIPHAZ
247
Job 18
THE REPLY OF BILDAD
261
Job 19
JOBS REJOINDER TO BILDAD
267
Job 20
THE REPLY OF ZOPHAR
279
Job 21
JOBS REJOINDER TO ZOPHAR
289
Job 22
ELIPHAZS STATEMENT
301
Job 23
JOBS RESPONSE TO ELIPHAZ: HIS ARDENT DESIRE
FOR CONFRONTATION WITH GOD
310
Job 24
JOBS RESPONSE TO ELIPHAZ (CONTINUED, VV. 1-12),
WITH TWO CITATIONS FROM WISDOM POETRY (VV. 13-18, 19-25)
314
Contents
vii
Job 25 and 26
THE INTRODUCTION OF BILDADS THIRD ADDRESS:
INTRODUCED BY 26.2-4, CONTINUED BY 25.2-6
AND CONCLUDED BY 26.5-15
325
Job 27
JOBS FINAL RESPONSE TO HIS FRIENDS
333
Job 28
AN INDEPENDENT POEM ON THE TRANSCENDENCE OF WISDOM
340
Job 29
JOBS REVIEW OF HIS FORMER PROSPERITY
351
Job 30
JOBS PLAINT
363
Job 31
JOBS GREAT OATH OF PURGATION
376
Job 3237
INTERPOLATION
392
Job 32
ELIHUS FIRST ADDRESS (VV. 6-22)
AFTER THE PROSE INTRODUCTION (VV. 1-5)
393
Job 33
ELIHUS FIRST STATEMENT
399
Job 34
ELIHUS SECOND STATEMENT
412
Job 35.1; 33.31-33; 35.236.25

ELIHUS THIRD ADDRESS
423
Job 36.2637.13
ELIHUS CITATION OF A HYMN OF PRAISE
435
Job 37.14-24
CONCLUSION OF THE ELIHU SECTION: ADDRESS TO JOB
447
INTRODUCTION TO JOB 3841
451
Job 38
THE DIVINE DECLARATION: PART I
455
Job 39 and 40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-6)

THE DIVINE DECLARATION: CONTINUED
469
viii
The Book of Job
Job 40.2, 7-14

THE DIVINE DECLARATION: CONCLUSION
482
Job 40.3-5; 42.2-6

JOBS SUBMISSION
485
Job 40.1541.26 (EVV 34)

WISDOM POEMS ON NATURAL THEMES
489
Job 42.7-17
THE EPILOGUE
503
Bibliography
508
PREFACE
At his death in 2000, John Gray, who was Professor of Hebrew and Semitic
Languages in the University of Aberdeen, left a complete manuscript of a
commentary on the Book of Job. It came into my hands through the good
ofces of Professor William Johnstone, Grays successor at Aberdeen, and
was entrusted to Shefeld Phoenix Press by his daughter Mrs Jean Reynolds,
who, with a certain degree of trepidation, personally conveyed the sole typescript copy of the book to Shefeld.
The very lengthy manuscript had to be completely retyped, a heroic task
which Duncan Burns undertook with his characteristic skill and enthusiasm.
It needed nevertheless a number of readings of the proofs and very many
editorial interventions to remove inconsistencies and minor blemishes, not
least in standardizing and checking the transliteration of the Hebrew. I was
glad to have the opportunity of doing the editorial work, which could not be
farmed out to a copy-editor, but needed the expertise of a fellow-commentator
on the Book of Job. I apologize for the unconscionable delay in completing the
work, which was sadly competing for time with various other projects.
The chief interest of the present volume lies in its philological observations,
all of them worthy of consideration. Gray brought to his work on the Hebrew
text of Job a lifetime of experience with Arabic and Ugaritic texts, and made
many original suggestions for the meaning of passages. When it came to
emendations of the text, which the Book of Job is sorely in need of at many
places, Grays instinct everywhere was to accept only those where he could
show that the original text had been corrupted in the old script. This was an
unusual self-imposed limitation, but it had striking results.
In addition, Gray conceived his work on Job as an all-purpose commentary,
prexing a substantial General Introduction to the book as a whole and prefacing each section of translation and critical notes with an essay displaying his
own special form-critical and theological interests. In all these essays his own
distinctive approach is evident.
I believe that this outstanding commentary will be a tting tribute to the
sound judgment and innovative scholarship of its author.
David J.A. Clines
October 2010
1
ABBREVIATIONS
11QtargJob
AB
AV
Aq.
AfO
AJSL
Akk.
ALUOS
AnatSt
ANEP
ANET
AO
AnOr
Arab.
Aram.
ARW
ASTI
AuS
ATANT
ATD
ATR
BA
BASOR
BDB
BKAT
Bib
BotAT
BSO(A)S
BZAW
CB
CBQ
EHAT
EchB
ET
ETL
ETR
EVV
1
Targum of Job from Qumran Cave 11

Anchor Bible
Authorized Version
Aquila
Archiv fr Orientforschung
American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures
Akkadian
Annual of Leeds University Oriental Society
Anatolian Studies
James B. Pritchard (ed.), Ancient Near East in Pictures Relating to the
Old Testament (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1954)
James B. Pritchard (ed.), Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the
Old Testament (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1950)
Der Alte Orient
Analecta orientalia
Arabic
Aramaic
Archiv fr Religionswissenschaft
Annual of the Swedish Theological Institute
G. Dalman, Arbeit und Sitte in Palstina
Abhandlungen zur Theologie des Alten und Neuen Testaments
Das Alte Testament Deutsch
Anglican Theological Review
Biblical Archaeologist
Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research
Francis Brown, S.R. Driver and Charles A. Briggs,
A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1907)
Biblischer Kommentar: Altes Testament
Biblica
Die Botschaft des Alten Testaments
Bulletin of the School of Oriental (and African) Studies
Beihefte zur ZAW
The Century Bible
Catholic Biblical Quarterly
Exegetisches Handbuch zum Alten Testament
Echter Bible
Expository Times
Ephemerides theologicae lovanienses
tudes thologiques et religieuses
English Versions
Abbreviations
GB
GHAT
Gk.
GKC
HAT
Hebr.
HSAT
HTR
HUCA
ICC
JAOS
JBL
JJS
JMEOS
JNES
JPOS
JPTh
JQR
JR
JRAS
JSS
JTS
KAT
KB
KD
KEH
KHC
KS
LXX
MGWJ
MT
NCB
NEB
NICOT
OTL
OTS
PEFQS
PEQ
PR
RA
RB
RE
RevQ
RGG
xi
Gesenius-Buhl, Hebrisches und aramisches Handwrterbuch ber

das Alte Testament
Gttinger Handkommentar zum Alten Testament
Greek
Gesenius Hebrew Grammar (ed. E. Kautzsch; revised and trans. A.E.
Cowley; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1910)
Handbuch zum Alten Testament
Hebrew
Die Heilige Schrift des Alten Testaments
Harvard Theological Review
Hebrew Union College Annual
International Critical Commentary
Journal of the American Oriental Society
Journal of Biblical Literature
Journal of Jewish Studies
Journal of the Manchester Egyptian and Oriental Society
Journal of Near Eastern Studies
Journal of the Palestine Oriental Society
Jahrbcher fr protestantische Theologie
Jewish Quarterly Review
Journal of Religion
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society
Journal of Semitic Studies
Journal of Theological Studies
Kommentar zum Alten Testament
Ludwig Koehler and Walter Baumgartner (eds.), Lexicon in Veteris
Testamenti libros (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1953)
Kerygma und Dogma
Kurzgefasstes exegetisches Handbuch zum Alten Testament
Kurzer Hand-Commentar zum Alten Testament
A. Alt, Kleine Schriften zum Alten Testament, I (1953); II (1959); III
(1959)
Septuagint
Monatsschrift fr Geschichte und Wissenschaft des Judentums
Masoretic Text
New Century Bible
New English Bible
New International Commentary on the Old Testament
Old Testament Library
Oudtestamentische Studin
Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Statement
Palestine Exploration Quarterly
Le palais royal dUgarit
Revue dassyriologie et darchologie orientale
Revue biblique
Realencyklopdie fr protestantische Theologie und Kirche
Revue de Qumran
Die Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart: Handwrterbuch fr
Theologie und Religionswissenschaft 3 (ed. K. Galling; Tbingen:
J.C.B. Mohr, 195765)
xii
RHPR
RHR
RQ
RS
Theod.
ThLZ
TRu
RSV
S
SBLMS
SBOT
SBT
Sem
SGV
SSEA
Sym.
Syr.
T
Ug.
UT
V
VT
VTSup
WBC
WO
ZAW
The Book of Job

Revue dhistoire et de philosophie religieuses
Revue de lhistoire des religions
Revue de Qumran
Ras Shamra
Theodotion
Theologische Literaturzeitung
Theologische Rundschau
Revised Standard Version
Syriac (Peshitta)
SBL Monograph Series
The Sacred books of the Old Testament
Studies in Biblical Theology
Semitica
Sammlung Gemeinverstndlicher Vortrge und Schriften aus dem
Gebiet der Theologie und Religionsgeschichte
Society for the Study of Egyptian Antiquities. Publications
Symmachus
Syriac
Targum
Ugaritic
Cyrus H. Gordon, Ugaritic Textbook (AnOr, 38; Rome: Pontical
Biblical Institute Press, 1965)
Vulgate
Vetus Testamentum
Vetus Testamentum, Supplements
Word Biblical Commentaries
Die Welt des Orients
Zeitschrift fr die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft
Part I
GENERAL INTRODUCTION
Chapter 1
INTRODUCTION
In the grandeur of its conception, its daring questioning of the traditional faith,
its noble defence of an honest man, the noblest work of God, and in the
existential solution of the acute problem of the relation of human justice to the
justice of God in the human confrontation with the dreadful yet alluring
mystery (mysterium tremendum et fascinans) of the divine presence, and in
the wonderful range of poetic diction and imagery and the rich variety of
literary forms, each with its own peculiar signicance in the argument, the
book of Job well deserves the appraisal of Thomas Carlyle: One of the
grandest things ever written with pen (Carlyle 1908: 67). In view of the
limitations of Carlyles knowledge of Hebrew and cognate Semitic languages
and literatures, and especially in view of the relatively uncritical view of the
structure and notoriously difcult text of Job, Carlyles judgment, There is
nothing, I think, in the Bible or out of it, of equal literary merit, may be an
intuitive rather than a critical assessment, but it is also the assessment of
Hebrew specialists. Cornill (1892: 229), for instance, considered it the crown
of the Hebrew Wisdom-writings and one of the most wonderful products of
the human spirit, belonging to the literature of the ancient world like Dantes
Divina commedia and Goethes Faust, and, like both these mighty allembracing works, striving to explain the deepest secrets of existence, to solve
the ultimate mysteries of life. The assessment of even a Semitist like Cornill
and his contemporaries, however, was but a glimpse of the truth. As we may
appreciate one of our magnicent mediaeval abbeys from the ruins in which
there is still something of the nobility of the original which dees spoliation
and decay, so in the book of Job the imperishable beauty and truth, which still
delight and inspire, lay upon us the obligation to restore with renewed energy
whenever new scientic insights give us the means of doing so. In the case of
the book of Job, the moment is ripe for such restoration.
First this is demanded by fresh insights into analogous texts from Mesopotamia1 and a new appraisal of Egyptian Wisdom literature.2 G. Fohrers
1. Stamm 1946; Nougayrol 1952; van Dijk 1953: 119ff.; Kramer 1953; Kuschke 1956;
Gese 1958: 63ff. Relevant texts are conveniently published by Lambert 1960. See further
below.
1
Job 1 and 2: The Prologue
recognition of the use and adaptation of Hebrew literary forms in Job is a

signicant new contribution, affecting not only the argument of the author but
also the composition of his work and the recognition of redaction (Fohrer
1963a). The discovery of an Aramaic targum of Job at Qumran (11QtargJob)
from the latter half of the second century BCE (van der Ploeg and van der
Woude 1971), the earliest known version of the book of Job, permits a
reassessment of the Hebrew text and of the later versions. C.J. Gadds study of
the inscriptions of the Neobabylonian King Nabonaid at Harran (Gadd 1955)
has given evidence for the presence of the king and probably Jewish garrisons
in the oases of the Hejaz already established by the time of the appearance of
the book of Job, which is supported by an Aramaic fragment from Qumran
published by J.T. Milik (1956) that refers to the association of Nabonaid with
Jews in the Hejaz. We would question A. Guillaumes use of this evidence to
support his thesis of the provenance of the book of Job from this community in
the Hejaz and the reection of their HebrewArabic bilingualism in the many
Arabic cognates in the book (Guillaume 1944 and 1963), which must certainly
be modied by the recognition of cognates in Akkadian, Assyrian, Ugaritic,
Aramaic and Syriac often in common with Guillaumes Arabisms. Nevertheless, those texts widen the horizon reected in the book of Job, which in
fact we expect in the dispersion of the Jews after the Babylonian Conquest.
The time is ripe, too, to apply our new knowledge of the literature of Canaan
from Ras Shamra, with its grammatical features, poetic diction and imagery, to
the many linguistic and textual problems in Job. The contribution of such
Ugaritic experts as M.J. Dahood (1962) and M.H. Pope (1965) to the specic
problems of Job is most welcome, though all Ugaritic experts would admit that
this matter should be very critically handled.
These are the outstanding, though not the only, advances in the scientic
eld of OT language and literature and related studies which have permitted
an impressive reconstruction of this great memorial of Hebrew thought and
literature. It is the conviction that it is now possible to effect this reconstruction to such a remarkable degree of fullness and enhanced elucidation that
prompts the present study.
2. For a survey of the Egyptian material with full appraisal, see Schmid 1966: 8-84,
202-23.
1
Chapter 2
JOB IN THE CONTEXT OF NEAR EASTERN
WISDOM LITERATURE
Jewish tradition associated wisdom with Solomon, and it is signicant that this
period is characterized by a marked degree of humanism and cosmopolitan
interest in Israel. Solomon ruled a kingdom which lay athwart lines of communication between Mesopotamia and Egypt and included the head of the
Gulf of Aqaba, which was so vital to the mercantile kingdoms of South Arabia
and Egypt, as evidenced by the visit of the Queen of Sheba. It was important
that an ofcial class should be trained to deal with foreign correspondence in
affairs of state both at home and in diplomatic activity abroad. The marriage of
Solomon and a daughter of the Pharaoh is evidence of this new involvement of
Israel. Consequently the wise men (amm), on whom the training of the
administrative class devolved, were more and more interested in the educational traditions of Mesopotamia and Egypt, both in the methods and
objectives of the older sages and in their works.
Characteristic of the sapiential tradition both of Mesopotamia from the
Sumerian domination in the third millennium BCE and of Egypt was the
scientic interest in nature and society, which is attested by lists of phenomena
according to their classication. Thus plants, animals, minerals, tools, equipment, clothes, adornment, food, drink, buildings, etc., are so listed, and society
is classied according to professions both in Sumerian1 and Egyptian texts
(Gardiner 1947). Such texts had doubtless great value in giving young scribes
practice in writing in the complicated cuneiform syllabic script and ideogram
and in hieroglyphics, but they had a deeper signicance. They are evidence of
belief in a divinely appointed Order in nature and society, which the Egyptians
called maat, and of a serious effort to recognize evidences of this Order and
inculcate a respect for it. H.H. Schmid in fact speaks of such lists and wisdom
texts compiled under the same presupposition as having the purpose of
initiation of the students into this Order (Schmid 1966: 21-22). The use of
1. Chiera 1929; Matous 1933; Schmid 1966: 95ff. The actual classication is the contribution of the Sumerians. The Semitic Akkadians used the lists on the basis of SumerianAkkadian lexical tables.
1
2. Job in the Context
classied lists of phenomena of this type in Israel is no doubt the factual

source of the tradition of Solomons encyclopaedic nature-lore (1 Kgs 5.12-13
[EVV 5.32-33]) (Alt 1937).
In the Book of Job the citation of instances of Gods power and providence
in the earth (38.4-7) and sea (38.8-11), the disposition of the day (38.12-15),
and oods and storms (38.35-38), and in certain animals grouped according to
their particular properties, such as the freedom of the wild ass (39.5-8), the
untameable nature of the wild ox (39.9-12), the speed of the ostrich (39.1318), etc., is probably a poetic development of such a classied list. In this case,
in view of the belief in a Divine Order which underlies such lists in the
Sumerian, Egyptian and Hebrew wisdom tradition, the implication of the
Divine Declaration in Job 38.239.30 and its relevance to the problem of the
relation of Job in his unmerited suffering to the Divine Order which his faith
assumed is obvious.
The grouping of phenomena in nature and society according to their
afnities made sages in Mesopotamia and Egypt aware also of their differentiae. Such a preoccupation with the differentiae as a problem in the context of
belief in the Divine Order may be reected in the controversial dialogue
between different parties such as Summer and Winter (van Dijk 1953),
Dumuzu and Enkidu, the shepherd and the farmer (ANET, 41ff.), and the Palm
and the Tamarisk (Lambert 1960: 150ff.), where each vaunts its own advantages and criticizes the attributes and assets of the other. This reects the
exercise of value judgments and the tendency to seek evidence for the Divine
Order not only in harmony but in tension between opposites. The dispute
between the Palm and the Tamarisk suggests at once a rough analogy in
Jothams fable of the trees in Judg. 9.7-15, which is probably not an isolated
instance of such a text in Israel.
Not only natural phenomena might be collated according to their afnities
and differentiae; situations in human relationships might be also so presented.
This was done in proverbs, where situations might be presented with or
without imagery, usually with respect to the relationship of cause and effect. A
general truth might be so expressed or a collection of proverbs might express
various facets of the truth that are mutually complementary, as often in the
presentation of proverbs in antithetic couplets in the Book of Proverbs,
especially in Proverbs 1015. This convention was employed to a very much
more limited extent in Mesopotamia.
Proverb collections are numerous in the Sumerian sapiential tradition in
Southern Mesopotamia (Kramer 1956: 152-59; Gordon 1959), where again
they attest the recognition of the Divine Order and the effort to adjust the
philosophy and behaviour of society to conform to it in the developing
situation. In the OT even in an early section of Proverbs, for instance chs. 10
15, we notice in the sharp antithesis between wisdom and folly, and between
good and evil conduct and their consequences, a sharper challenge to the
individual and a more determined effort not only to recognize Gods Order,
1
The Book of Job
but to bring humans into conformity with it.2 This doubtless is a consequence
of the adaptation of the wisdom tradition of the Near East to the ethos and
faith of the Covenant community by emphasizing empiric moral facts and
experiences.
The stability of the existing order is also the concern of certain texts from
Mesopotamia, such as the Instruction of the antediluvian Shuruppak to his son
Ziusudra the survivor of the Flood (Lambert 1960: 92-95), or the Counsels of
Wisdom (pp. 96-107), and from Egypt the Instruction for the Pharaoh
Merikare (Thomas 1958: 155-61), the Precepts of Anii (ANET, 420ff.), the
Pleading of the Eloquent Peasant (ANET, 407-10) and the Teaching of
Amenemope (ANET, 421-25). These either advocated to the ruler the principles to be observed in government or made clear to future administrators the
Order in nature and society which they were to labour to realize.
In all this matter a Divine Order was accepted, ME in Sumerian, maat in
Egyptian, which might have been expressed in Hebrew either by eeq, what
is right and proper,3 and secondarily justice, or by mip, properly the
government, or order sustained by the divine ruler.4 In this context in
proverbs and precepts emphasis was laid on the general principle of cause and
effect, sin and retribution, virtue and reward, as in the conventional wisdom
tradition in the OT represented by Proverbs and by Jobs interlocutors.
However, from an early age, sages in Egypt and Mesopotamia were
embarrassed by the fact that in actual experience the Order in which they
believed (and of which they saw so much evidence in nature and society) was
apparently disrupted by occasional vicissitudes. In Egypt for instance the
security and assurance concerning the Order, of which the state and cult in the
Old Kingdom (third millennium BCE) was held to be the expression, was
disrupted by the eclipse of the state at the Amorite Invasion in the First
Intermediate Period of Egyptian history (c. 23002050 BCE). This uncertainty
is reected in such a text as the Dialogue of a Man with his Own Soul (DOTT,
162-67), partly in prose and partly in verse, on the apparent lack of moral
order in the world and the pointlessness of life, the note on which the Dialogue
in Job opens (ch. 3), with Jobs abjuration of the day he was born. There is of
course an essential difference; the two texts are in dialogue form, but the
Egyptian text, where the man is tempted to commit suicidewhich Job never
contemplatesis prompted by the general social situation, while the Book of
Job expresses the intense personal agony of one deeply involved in an acute
2. This is well emphasized by Schmid 1966: 150ff.
3. Ringgren (1947: 49, 58) recognizes the correspondence of maat to Hebrew eqh;
so Horst (RGG3, 1404) and Schmid (1966: 159), who notes the correspondence of Hebrew
h eeq to, for example, ry maat, signifying the creative function of humanity and
society in the upholding of maat order.
4. This translation of Hebrew mip must be emphasized as basic in view of the signicance of the cognate p in Ugaritic in parallelism with mlk (king) and zbl (prince) in the
Ras Shamra texts.
1
crisis of personal belief. Fundamentally, however, the problems of the writers

of both texts were the same, the discrepancy between experiential facts and the
Divine Order in which both believed.
In Mesopotamia too this discrepancy was felt, and it is expressed in several
texts which recall the theme and indeed the diction of the Book of Job. One of
these in fact is popularly known as the Babylonian Job, though the afnity is
more formal and supercial than real.5
This work (Lambert 1960: 21-62), which begins with the words ludlul bl
nmeqi (I will praise the lord of wisdom), is known from copies of a text of
four tablets (c. 500 lines) from Ashurbanipals library at Nineveh, the original
probably going back to the fteenth century BCE. This is not a dialogue, but a
song of praise for deliverance from various troubles. The list of these, to be
sure, is reminiscent of the sufferings of Job, and the phraseology of both works
has much in common. Thus the sufferer complains like Job that he is forsaken
by his gods though he has been scrupulous in his religious and social duties.
Arguing from his sufferings to sin, like Jobs orthodox friends, he complains:
I wish I knew that these things were pleasing to ones god!
What is proper to oneself is an offence to ones god,
What in ones own heart seems despicable is proper to ones god. Who knows
the will of the gods in heaven?
Who understands the plans of the underworld gods?
Where have mortals learned the way of a god?
The sufferer is popularly shunned like Job under the impression that he is
under the divine curse, which was anciently believed to be infectious:
My city frowns on me as an enemy;
Indeed my land is savage and hostile.
My friend has become foe,
My companion has become a wretch and a devil.
In his savagery my comrade denounces me,
Constantly my associates furbish their weapons.
My intimate friend has brought my life into danger;
My slave has publicly cursed me in the assembly.
My house ( ) the mob has defamed me,
When my acquaintance sees me, he passes me by on the other side.
My family treats me as an alien.
5. This is generally recognized. Thus M. Buttenwieser (1922: 10) rightly states this
text lacks all the essential points that give the Job story its distinctive character. But his
criticism refers only to the narrative framework of the Book of Job, and so fails to reckon
seriously with the real afnities of this and other Mesopotamian texts of this type. Those
texts are of the utmost value for a comparative study of the literature and thought of Israel
in the ancient Near East, but it is of the essence of comparative study that more than one
instance should be cited, and that due signicance should be attached to such afnities as
may be established, so that the distinctive characteristics may be appreciated. J.J. Stamm
(1946: 19) shows a better appreciation as well as due reserve in asking if this work brings
us into the forecourt of the OT, especially the Book of Job.
1
The Book of Job
Compare Job 19.13-17:

My brothers have withdrawn far,
My acquaintances are strangers to me,
My kinsmen and friends have deserted me,
The sojourners in my house have forgotten me,
Yea, my slave-girls treat me as an outsider,
I am a stranger in their eyes.
I have called to my slave, and he does not answer me,
I have to entreat him with my own mouth.
My breath is repugnant to my wife,
And I am putrid to my own children.
Another feature common to the two works is the statement of innocence:

Yet I myself was thinking only of prayer and supplication;
Supplication was my concern, sacrice my rule;
The day of the worship of the gods was my delight,
The day of my goddesss procession was my prot and wealth (cf. Job 29.717).
This close correspondence incidentally may indicate that the author of the
Book of Job was familiar with this and similar Mesopotamian texts, for
example the Babylonian Theodicy (see below, pp. 10-15), but the explanation is that in this particular both these texts and the Book of Job reect
the conventional language of the Plaint of the Sufferer in fast-liturgies in
Mesopotamia and Israel, and are variants of this common literary type.6 The
Babylonian sufferer in such texts is never confronted by God except through a
dream-revelation, nor does he, like Job, challenge such an encounter. In fact
his hope of relief is quickened by a dream, and in the text cited he is freed
from all his diseases by the lord of wisdom, that is Marduk, the lord of
exorcism. This sudden relief may have suggested the complete rehabilitation
of Job in the epilogue to the book (Job 42.7-17), which of course is quite
external to the theological substance of the complete Book of Job.7 In this
Babylonian text the essential difference from the Book of Job is obvious in
spite of undeniable afnities. The closest afnity of the Babylonian text with
the OT is with the Plaint of the Sufferer in the Psalms, both in form and in
content. These list the sufferings of the subject in similar hyperbole, posing
also the problem of the suffering of one who can condently state his
6. So Dhorme (1926: lxxxvi), who, however, fails to recognize all the characteristic
elements in the Mesopotamian genre and the possibility that the author of Job deliberately
adapted it.
7. H. Gese (1958: 63ff.), recognizing the happy ending, categorizes such texts as
Klagehrungs-paradigms (the type the Plaint of the Sufferer heard). He recognizes three
main elements, the statement of the sufferers unhappy situation, his plaint and his relief,
and goes on to suggest that the Job-tradition which was the source or the extant Book of Job
conformed to this type, the author retaining the theme of the rst and nal components of
the prototype, but adapting the plaint as a controversy in the Dialogue in the book.
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exemplary conduct. Both record their deliverance by God, to whom vows are
made and paid (see Lambert 1960: 61, ll. 91ff.; cf. Ps. 107.22), and thanks are
rendered. The theme of such Mesopotamian texts in fact is that of Psalm 107
with its list of sufferings and its refrain:
They cried unto the Lord in their trouble,
And he delivered them from their distress.
Signicantly, both these texts include a hymn of praise to God for his
deliverance and all his great works (Ps. 107.32ff.; cf. Lambert 1960: 59-61, ll.
33ff.). More specically, since like the Mesopotamian texts and Job it is
conscious of the problem of the theodicy, Psalm 34 may be cited, beginning
like the Mesopotamian text with the theme of praise:
I will bless the Lord at all times,
His praise shall continually be in my mouth.
The discussion of the moral problem of an innocent orphan wronged in an

order believed to be under the government of just gods is presented in dialogue
in the Babylonian Theodicy (Lambert 1960: 63-91), known from texts in
Ashurbanipals library but dating from c. 1000 BCE.
The text opens with the miserable case of the orphan bereft of his parents by
the act of God, which recalls the problem stated by Job (3.23):
(Why is light given) to a man whose way is hidden,
And about whom God has set obstructions?
The answer in the Babylonian Theodicy is that of orthodox theology: death

is the common lot of all, but
He who waits on his god has a protecting angel,
The humble man who fears his god accumulates wealth
Compare the words of Eliphaz in Job 4.7-8:

Recall, what man if innocent ever perished?
Or where were the upright ever cut off ?
In contradiction, the Babylonian sufferer cites his sufferings in all their varied
detail, with which we are familiar in Job and the Plaint of the Sufferer in the
Psalms and in Mesopotamian fast-liturgies. This evokes a rebuke from his
friend:
But you (
) your balanced reason like a madman,
You make (your
) diffuse and irrational
Compare the preface to the speech of Eliphaz in Job 4.4-5:

Your words would raise the fallen,
Would strengthen bowing knees;
But now when it reaches you you cannot bear it,
And when it comes to you you are non-plussed.
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The Book of Job
11
Like Jobs friends the friend of the Babylonian sufferer can simply reiterate
the traditional doctrine of retribution and reward, which the sufferer counters
by citing the fact of the prosperity of the impious:
The savage lion who devoured the choicest esh,
Did it bring its our-offering to appease-the goddesss anger?
( ) the nouveau riche who has multiplied his wealth,
Did he weigh out precious gold for the goddess Mami?
(Have I) held back offerings? I have prayed to my god,
(I have) pronounced the blessing over the goddesss regular sacrice
Compare Job 21.7-13:

Why do the wicked live,
Prosper and grow mighty in power?
Their seed is established in their presence,
And their offspring stand fast before their eyes;
Their houses are safe from fear,
No rod of God is on them;
Their bull engenders without fail,
Their cow calves and does not cast her calf.
They send forth their little ones like a ock,
And their children skip about;
They sing to the timbrel and the lyre,
And make merry to the sound of the pipe.
They nish their days in prosperity,
And go down to Sheol in peace.
The friend of the Babylonian sufferer nevertheless reasserts the principle of

reward and retribution and urges that the ways of God are beyond scrutiny:
You are as stable as the earth; but the plan of God is remote
Compare Job 36.2637.24:

Behold God is great, and we know him not;
The number of his years is unsearchable.
Lo, God is great beyond our knowledge,
The number of his years is unsearchable
To the Almighty we cannot attain,
Great in power and justice
Wherefore let men fear him;
He does not regard any who are wise in their own conceit.
The debate in the Babylonian Theodicy ends with the friends concession
that the social disorders are the result of human nature created and tolerated by
the gods, and the sufferer is content with the prospect of his friends sympathy
and the hope of the gods eventual mercy. The ultimate result is the same as in
Job, but is much more facile. The Mesopotamian sage with academic detachment acquiesces in the situation; the theologian in Job agonizes over the
paradox of the suffering of the innocent and the Order of God, and nally nds
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satisfaction in the fact that though God gives no answer which is intellectually
satisfying he is not aloof from the sufferer. The traditional view that suffering
implied sin and alienation from God was exploded in the conclusion of Job,
and when the sufferer in Job rose above this traditional fatalism he found fresh
hope in the living fellowship of God:
As the ear hears I had heard of you,
But now my eye has seen you.
Another such text is that published by J. Nougayrol (1952) as Une version

ancienne du Juste Souffrant , hereafter cited according to its enumeration in
the Louvre AO 4462. This text, from the sixteenth century, is fragmentary.
Nougayrol considers that it began with a description of the prosperity of the
subject, the loss of which he deplores, and with the description of his calamity.
This would suggest an analogy with the Prologue in Job. The actual text
begins with a statement by his friend supporting the description of the
subjects sufferings. The sufferer then states his innocence, mentioning the
support of his friend in his afiction:
Does brother not belong to brother?
Is a friend not bitten when his friend is bitten?
Job may refer to this traditional role of the friend in such a text as this in his
animadversion on his friends lack of sympathy in 6.14ff.:
He who withdraws his loyalty from his friend
Forsakes the fear of the Almighty.
The sufferer then states that in spite of his adversity he has remained faithful
to his god. He acknowledges his gods blessings which he has enjoyed and of
which he is now deprived, as Job remembers his former blessing (ch. 29), with
which he contrasts his present misery (ch. 30). In this also the Babylonian
sufferer is supported by his friend.
Then the sufferers plaint is heard and his faith vindicated in a Divine
Declaration:
Thy dmarche is worthy of a man.
Thy heart is innocent.
This strikingly recalls the divine approval of the words of Job in 42.7,
referring, we believe, to the source material of the Dialogue of the present
Book of Job, which the writer has adapted. The god continues:
The years are fullled, the days have redeemed thy suffering.
Hadst thou not been called to life, how wouldst thou have come
to the end of this serious illness?
Thou hast known anguish, fear in its full extent.
Until the end hast thou borne thy heavy load.
The way was blocked; it is open to thee.
1
The Book of Job
13
The road is levelled; grace is granted to thee.

In the future forget not thy god,
Thy creator when thou hast recovered thy health.
Nougayrol considers that the text ended with a description of the rehabilitation
of the sufferer, but here the text is fragmentary. Apart from the afnities of
thought and expression with the Book of Job which have been noted above,
there is a striking afnity in pattern in the initial disaster after prosperity, the
plaint of the sufferer describing his grief in detail, the protestation of innocence and the Divine Declaration heralding the rehabilitation of the sufferer.
The differences between this text with its happy ending and the Book of Job
are at once apparent, of course, but the epilogue in the Book of Job (42.11-12)
agrees with the Mesopotamian text, and the divine approval of the words of
Job in 42.7 indicates that the present Dialogue has been considerably adapted
from a source which after H. Gese we believe to have been the literary prototype of the source of the Book of Job, probably mediated through the Plaint of
the Sufferer,8 which is attested in the OT in the Psalms, notably, so far as
concerns this subject Psalms 37 and 73, and in Jeremiah and Lamentations.
That there was such a literary type to serve as an ultimate source for the Book
of Job is indicated by a Sumerian text from c. 20001700 published by J.J.A.
van Dijk in 1953 (see van Dijk 1953 and Kramer 1955).
Like the text ludlul bl nmeqi (I will praise the lord of wisdom) and
Psalm 34, the text opens with the exhortation to the man to praise constantly
the exaltation of his god, which suggests Jobs sentiment (1.21):
Yahweh gave, Yahweh has taken;
Blessed be the name of Yahweh,
and the advice of Elihu to Job (36.24):

Remember to extol his work
Of which men have sung.
The text continues with the call to the sufferer, a man (cf. Job 1.1, There
was a man), to state his plaint to God. He is aided by his wife and friends,
as the wife and friends of Job in the source used by the writer of our present
Book of Job may have abetted Job in his occasional questioning of Gods
moral order, as Job 2.9 and 42.7 indicatethough, as 42.7 suggests, Job, like
the Mesopotamian sufferer, resists the temptation to let this note predominate.
As in the other texts cited above, the sufferer, like Job in ch. 31, exculpates
himself of social sins, and addresses his plaint to his god, hoping for relief.
8. This well exemplies the peculiar adaptation of literary types in the book of Job from
the situation with which they were traditionally associated, which Fohrer has noted as an
original feature of the method of the author of the Book of Job in his Studien zum Buch
Hiob (1963b: esp. pp. 70ff.), which may certainly be said to have given a new orientation to
the study of the book with very fruitful results.
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14
The text ends with the statement that his god had heard the right words of the
suppliant and had rehabilitated him, turning his sufferings into joy. The
Mesopotamian prototype indicates that the epilogue in Job is simply a survival
of the writers source which he did not adapt as he did the Dialogue, conscious
no doubt of the value of his source for those not sufciently mature to
appreciate the searching philosophy of the Dialogue.
H. Gese (1958) has admirably emphasized the afnity and difference
between the Book of Job and those wisdom texts of Mesopotamia. The
connection between the situation of the sufferer and sins of omission and
commission which they emphasize according to the conventional ethical
theory of the day is voiced by Jobs friends (4.8ff.; 5; 8; 15.17ff.; 18.1ff.; 20),
even though the divine economy in the moral order is admitted to be inscrutable; Jobs friends also represent the Mesopotamian wisdom tradition in
emphasizing the limitation of humans before the Almighty and Omniscient
(4.1721; 15.2-16; 25), and in their urge to Job to cast himself on Gods mercy
(5.8-22; 22.21ff.). All these traditional positions are disputed by the author of
Job. He questions the conventional faith in the theodicy (Job 6.15ff.; 13.1ff.;
16.2ff.; 19; 21); the insignicance of a human before God reects on God, who
condescends to inquisition and afiction with such a one (7; 9-10), and
whether Job must nally abase himself before the Almighty and inscrutable. If
Job must do this he has at least maintained his innocence (16.18-19; 31) and
won the assurance that he is not beneath the notice of God.
Those texts from the sages of Egypt and Mesopotamia by no means exhaust
the sapiential material available to the sages of Israel; they are only those most
relevant to the Book of Job. Afnities of thought and phraseology are striking,
though the sense of the whole differs markedly from Jobs bold, almost
blasphemous questioning of the divine economy. What is most important,
however, is the afnity between the Mesopotamian texts and the Book of Job
in literary form or pattern, within which the writer of Job adapted the tenor of
what we believe to be his prototype. This will be largely the theme of our
study of the Composition of the Book of Job (see below, pp. 56-75).
Common to those Mesopotamian texts, as to the other sapiential texts we
have cited both from Mesopotamia and Egypt, is the assumption of a Divine
Order in which all in nature and society is integrated. Those texts that most
resemble the Book of Job reveal in some degree the embarrassment of their
authors in face of reality, for instance the suffering of the innocent with the
consequent impairing of their moral potential, which seems to contradict the
Divine Order. The unpalatable fact of the suffering of the innocent, which
contradicts the ethical principle of retribution and reward in the Divine Order,
is not equally prominent in all the Mesopotamian texts cited. The emphasis on
this element seems to depend on the nature of the text. In ludlul bl nmeqi,
for instance, the opening and conclusion obviously suggest a text intimately
related to the cult, that is to say not a wisdom text proper. Here the suffering of
the innocent and the moral problem it raises is frankly admitted, but it is
1
The Book of Job
15
connected with the confession, or in this case the protestation, of the

worshippers innocence, and serves to emphasize his dependence on the grace
of God. On the other hand, the problem of the suffering of the innocent is
much more emphasized in the Babylonian Theodicy, where the sufferer to be
sure nally depends on Gods grace, but that dependence is acquiescence
rather than real faith. This, as the sharp dialectic indicates, is a wisdom text
proper. It is not so easy to decide the nature of the other two, though the
introduction of the sufferer in the Sumerian Job as a man rather indicates a
wisdom text serving a philosophic discussion of a hypothetical case, even
though, like certain wisdom psalms in the OT, for example Psalms 22, 37 and
73, it takes the form of a cultic text. In this case, as in those psalms in the OT,
the fact that the emphasis falls not on the problem of the suffering of the
innocent but on the revelation of Gods grace indicates that the purpose of the
text was not to accentuate the problem but to defend the belief in Gods Order
by seeking a solution beyond philosophy in religion. This is the solution also
in the Book of Job, though both the problem and the religious experience in
which a solution is found are much more intensive than in any of the Mesopotamian texts. All those texts indicate how intimately wisdom in the ancient
Near East was connected with religion. The Babylonian Theodicy, which is
so strongly critical and most humanist in character, still concludes with
acquiescence to the Divine Order. The text ludlul bl nmeqi, which is the
most liturgic, seeks rst, like the author of the Book of Job, to solve the moral
problem by humanistic argument before nally seeking the answer in religion.
The problem is posed, as we have seen, by the observation:
What is proper to oneself is an offence to ones god
Where have mortals learnt the way of a god?
But this is also a statement of the relative nature of humanity and its system of
values, a philosophic argument cited in defence of the Divine Order, which is
accepted as absolute.
It is to be noted that Job, though embarrassed by the discrepancy between
the justice of humans (with its principle of sin and retribution and virtue and
reward) and the justice of God, does not quite abandon his belief in the Order
of God and the validity of the human conception of justice within it. Otherwise
there would be no point in his reiterated appeal for a hearing in open tribunal
with God. Like the Mesopotamian writers, the author of Job nds the nal
solution in religion. Only in Job is the orthodox doctrine of the theodicy
subjected to a more thorough and severe criticism, so that the sufferer is
isolated with his God beyond all social conventions and doctrine to nd the
solution of his moral problem in that living confrontation and communion
beyond the limitations of tradition in religion. Again the answer to the problem
of Job, as in its Mesopotamian counterparts, is given in the Divine Declaration, where the sufferer is assured of communion with God. But, as distinct
from the Mesopotamian texts, God in Job so far respects the capacity of the
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sufferer as to give him sufcient evidence to make a solution of his problem at

least partly intelligible intellectually, though full conviction is the result of his
existential experience of the living God.
The Mesopotamian matter which we have cited suggests such a prototype
for the source of the Book of Job, though the saga style of the Prologue and
Epilogue rather suggest a popular version of such a work. That literary works
of this character from Mesopotamia were not unknown in Palestine is now
indicated by a fragment of the Gilgamesh Legend from the thirteenth century
found at Megiddo.9 More relevant to the present subject, Mesopotamian
sapiential texts are among more recent discoveries at Ras Shamra. Akkadian
and Sumerian wisdom texts have been found in the vicinity of the palace at
Ras Shamra. The texts found include proverbs (Nougayrol 1968: 273-300),
fragments of the Gilgamesh Legend (pp. 300-10), which is also a sapiential
text despite its epic form, and, what is particularly relevant to our problem of
the innocent sufferer, a text from c. 1300 in Akkadian script and language (pp.
264-73) which carries it back to the age of Hammurabi in the opinion of
Nougayrol (pp. 266f.).
The new text most closely resembles ludlul bl nmeqi among the Mesopotamian texts cited. It opens by presenting the sufferer as non-plussed; neither
oracles nor the consulting of livers and entrails nor omens nor dreams explain
his sufferings with relation to his deserts nor indicate an end to them. His
nearest kinsmen implore him to bow to his fate (cf. Jobs wife), while at the
same time offering him solace. Nevertheless they mourn him as one whose ill
is irremediable.
Signicantly, in view of the afnity with ludlul bl nmeqi, the sufferer
anticipates revival through the grace of Marduk. The anticipated relief suggests
again the theme of his sufferings, and here the language is reminiscent of Job
and the Plaint of the Sufferer in the Psalms:
I knew no more dreams, and sleep no longer embraced me,
I lay all the night awake;10
In the midst of my dreams the grave ever dogged me;
I was ever the prey of the ill I had suffered11
For sustenance I had tears instead of food.12
As Job blesses the name of the Lord even under the stroke of calamity (Job
1.20), the sufferer, like the author of ludlul bl nmeqi, praises Marduk,
without whom, he confesses, he would have had no breath to voice his plaint.
9. See Goetze and Levy 1959. The Gilgamesh Epic, despite its form and entertainment
value, is nevertheless a humanist text on the sapiential subject of the natural limitations of
humans despite the high aspirations of the glory, jest and riddle of the world.
10. Cf. Job 7.4.
11. Cf. Job 7.13-15.
12. Cf. Job 324; Ps. 42.3.
1
The Book of Job
17
The very consciousness of suffering is evidence of the care of his god. Job
never makes this declaration of faith in the biblical book, but it is voiced by
Eliphaz in his argument Happy is the man whom God reproves (Job 5.1721), which like the Ugaritic text freely admits the ill to which humanity is
subject, but holds rm faith in the grace of God. The intensication of suffering as evidence of the persistent grace of God is also the theme of Elihus
argument in the addendum to the Book of Job (chs. 3237) in Job 33.14-30,
culminating in the declaration (33.29-30):
Behold, God has done all these things,
Twice, three times with a man,
To bring back his soul from the pit
That he may see the light of life.
The declaration of faith leads on to praise of the sufferers god.

The conception of the sufferer nding the solution to his troubles, even
against the evidence of facts, in praise of God is familiar in the Book of Job,
not only in Jobs heroic blessing of the name of God in his utter destitution
(Job 1.20), but in the speech of Elihu (32.637.4), in the undertones of hymns
of praise inspired by the New Year liturgy with its central theme of the
Kingship and Ordered Government of God (36.5-23; 36.2637.13) and the
explicit injunction (36.24):
Remember to extol his works
Though Job is not named in any such text from Ras Shamra, the antiquity of
the tradition of the worthy sufferer attested in this sapiential text seems to
corroborate the antiquity of the Job-tradition, as indicated in Ezek. 24.14, 20,
where Job is associated with Danel, now known from the Ugaritic Legend
of Aqht as a gure of the heroic past in the second millennium BCE. This
association, moreover, is not only an argument for the antiquity of the Jobtradition, but also for its currency in the urban culture of Canaan.
The afnities of the Book of Job with the sophisticated sapiential tradition
of Mesopotamia are not to be denied. But what of the characteristics of folktale,13 saga or epic14 in the Prologue and Epilogue?
13. J. Wellhausen (1914: 207 n. 2) proposed a folk-saga; K. Budde (1896) envisaged

this as a Volksbuch, but K. Kautzsch (1900) more cautiously proposed that the narrative
framework of the Book of Job was the modication of an older folktale rather freely
adapted by the author of the Book of Job; so also Hlscher 1937: 4f.
14. N.M. Sarna (1957) in particular noted the regular cadence, verbal repetition, conventional round numbers and rare vocabulary and forms familiar in the poetic epic in the
Ras Shamra texts. The same conventions, however, with the exception of the last two
features, are also characteristic of the prose of the earlier narrative sources of the Pentateuch, which in turn may have been inuenced by the oral tradition of the Canaanite epic.
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The view has been widely canvassed that the original of the Book of Job
was a popular tradition of a worthy man reduced to destitution, yet maintaining his faith despite the dissuasions of wife and friends until his eventual
vindication. This of course is to reverse the roles of Job and his friends in the
Dialogue of the extant book (as the divine appraisal of the words of Job and
the condemnation of those of his friends in 42.7 may indicate), and to lay the
emphasis in their assumed original less on the problem expressed in the
Dialogue than on the edifying theme of the fortitude and faith of Job and his
nal vindication. The Mesopotamian texts we have cited, however, though
emphasizing the nal deliverance of the sufferer, do not minimize the trial of
his faith, with which we are familiar in the arguments of Job. Those texts thus
suggest the possibility that the author of the Book of Job had at least available
a more sophisticated prototype than the popular folk-tale. This is further
suggested by the form of those Mesopotamian texts, the worthy man reduced
from his former comfort, his moral impasse, the divine intervention, or
theophany, the sufferers acknowledgment of divine grace. The recognition of
those essential elements in the Mesopotamian texts on the same problem as
the Book of Job is most important in the debate on the authenticity and signicance of corresponding elements in the structure of the Book of Job,
particularly the theophany and Divine Declaration, which has been taken as
secondary.15 Nor is the analogy between the Book of Job and the comparable
Mesopotamian texts remote and fortuitous. The new text from Ras Shamra is
evidence that the Mesopotamian tradition was cultivated also in Canaan two
centuries before the time of Solomon, when particularly Israel was introduced
to the sapiential prototype. At least one Egyptian wisdom text, the Protest of
the Eloquent Peasant on social injustice (ANET, 407-10) and the Aramaic
Proverbs of Ahiqar (Cowley 1923: 204-48; ANET, 427-30) are introduced by
an engaging story in narrative prose, though to be sure the Prologue and
Epilogue of Job show more characteristic features of oral saga or folk legend.
Those are familiar in the stories of the patriarchs in the older narrative sources
(J and E) in the Pentateuch, with which the narrative framework of Job has
been compared. Such features in the stories of the patriarchs, however, do not
preclude their sober, edifying purpose. Thus the story of Joseph, communicated in simple, dramatic, colourful prose, is none the less a wisdom text
on the subject of Gods providence in the vindication of a worthy sufferer (von
Rad 1953; 1958: 272ff.). In view of the theme of the ordeal of the worthy
sufferer in the Mesopotamian sapiential tradition as known from the evidence
of the new text from Ras Shamra and of the features of popular folk-narrative
in the Prologue and Epilogue to the Book of Job, it is possible that there was a
15. Alleging that the Divine Declaration is inconclusive P. Volz (1921) took the Divine
Declaration as secondary. J. Hempel (1930: 179) came to the same conclusion on the
grounds that it does not sufciently answer Jobs appeal in ch. 31. In the nature of the case,
however, in such a critical work as the Book of Job no such simple and satisfying answer
can be expected.
1
The Book of Job
19
popular version of the tradition of the ordeal of the worthy sufferer current in
Canaan, probably rst adapted as an edifying legend on the theme of the
sufferers fortitude and the nal vindication of his faith.
The sapiential original may have been transmitted in oral tradition in the
two centuries when the culture of Egypt and Mesopotamia in the cities of
Canaan suffered eclipse between the Philistine and Aramaean irruptions (c.
1200 BCE) and the renaissance under Solomon. In this popular form the Job
legend was apparently rst adapted in Hebrew tradition and may have gained
currency along with the patriarchal traditions, particularly that of Joseph, with
the teachings of the sages of Israel. The citation of Job as a gure of remote
antiquity like Noah and Danel, of exemplary righteousness (Ezek. 14.14) and
of saving efcacy (Ezek. 14.20; cf. Job 42.8), indicates that the popular
version of Job, including Prologue and Epilogue, at least to 42.11, was current
until the middle of the sixth century BCE. However, the sages also knew the
literary prototype in the Mesopotamian tradition of the worthy sufferer, which
they elaborated with emphasis rather on the moral problem of the Dialogue
than the nal vindication in the Epilogue. The role of Job in the Dialogue as
rst adapted in the Hebrew tradition (Job 42.7, on which Alt based his view
that the roles of Job and his friends in the present form of the book were
reversed) is quite ambiguous. The passage might indeed indicate that Job
maintained his faith and the orthodox doctrine against the criticisms of the
friends; but it might equally well indicate the divine disgust at the too facile
acceptance of the traditional faith and ethic, with the friends wilful dismissal
of the facts in defence of orthodox doctrine, which was actually a limitation of
the government of God (Gordis 1965: 305), and the divine approval of Jobs
franker approach and deeper concern. It is signicant that in the new text from
Ras Shamra the friends of the sufferer, in urging him to bow to his fate,
comforting him and mourning for him as if foredoomed to death, play the
same role as in the Prologue and Dialogue in Job. The fact that the sufferers
spiritual agony, though not so acute or sustained as in the Book of Job, was
already expressed in the Mesopotamian texts we have cited, and indeed was
familiar in the tradition of Israel in the Plaint of the Sufferer in the fast-liturgy,
suggests that this is seriously to be reckoned with in the immediate source of the
present Book of Job. In the latter the greater intensity of the authors concern for
the moral problem of the suffering of the worthy man is expressed by the
concentration of the criticism of the orthodox position in the person of Job in the
Dialogue, and of the arguments for the conventional faith in the ripostes of Jobs
friends. This quasi-dramatic arrangement, which results in a more systematic
marshalling of theses and antitheses, is peculiarly the contribution of the author
of Job and is symptomatic of the tradition of the sages which nds more pointed
expression in the Elihu addendum (Job 3237).
The Mesopotamian texts end in rehabilitation or the revelation of the divine
favour; in the theophany in Job no such rehabilitation is visualized, but Gods
answer is a challenge. This in itself is sufcient evidence that the subject is not
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alienated by his suffering as the orthodox ethic assumed. So long as humans

are confronted by God their suffering is bearable in the purpose of the eternal,
which they may glimpse in the prospect of wonders beyond wonders that speak of the
concern of God for all his creation and leave even the fullest revelation of God
that humans have experienced unexhausted and inexhaustible.
Chapter 3
JOB IN HEBREW WISDOM
The Book of Job is included in the third part of the OT canon, the Writings,
where, with Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, it is regarded as comprising that part of
Hebrew Wisdom which was accepted as canonical.
The humanistic character of wisdom (omh) in Israel has often been
stressed. It is the technical skill of the craftsman such as Bezalel and those
associated with him in the building and furnishing of the Tabernacle (Exod.
28.3; 35.25, 31; 36.1) and goldsmiths (Jer. 10.9) and sailors (Ezek. 27.8; Ps.
107.27). It applies to women skilled in lamentation, implying improvisation
(Jer. 9.16 [EVV 17]), and to music and psalm-composition (1 Kgs 5.10-12, cf.
1 Chron. 15.19; Ps. 49.4-5 [EVV 3-4]) and soothsaying where real sagacity and
resource were usually cloaked under the guise of traditional superstition (Gen.
41.8; Isa. 44.25). Skill in politics in war and peace is also denoted by omh
(Isa. 10.13; 29.14; Jer. 49.7). The essentially humanistic or intellectual character of omh is clearly indicated in the account of Solomons reign. In the
tradition of Solomons dream at Gibeon and its sequel (1 Kgs 3.4ff.), the
famous judgment between the two mothers, it denotes the capacity of discernment and the ability to decide a case, like the Arabic verb akama, with its
participle kimu(n) (governor). At this time in fact the wise (amm)
probably rst acquired status in Israel in association with the new governing
class in Solomons administration, and as those engaged, like the scribes in the
Egyptian bureaucracy, in preparing young men to succeed them. In the
Egyptian analogy, practical knowledge of the details of administration,
conduct towards superiors and inferiors and prudential advice to secure and
maintain success and to help in emergency were all communicated as the ripe
fruits of experience and mature reection. The ability to observe and classify
according respectively to differentiae and afnities was cultivated in Egypt by
the observation of natural phenomena and their classication, which is probably the source of the tradition that Solomon spoke of the trees, from the cedar
that is in Lebanon to the hyssop that grows out of the wall; he spoke also of
beasts, and of birds, and of reptiles, and of sh (1 Kgs 5.13 [EVV 4.33]).1 This
1. Alt 1953. R.B.Y. Scott (1955) emphasizes rather the signicance of Hezekiahs reign
in this connection (cf. Prov. 25.11), but admits the possibility of an earlier origin under
Solomon.
1
22
3. Job in Hebrew Wisdom
scientic classication according to common characteristics, which extended

beyond nature to society, is exemplied notably in the numerical clusters of
common cases in Prov. 30.15-16, 18-19, 21-23, 24-28, 29-31 and in Job in the
list of nocturnal criminals (Job 24.13-17) and of the creatures provided for and
endowed by God irrespective of human economy (Job 38.3939.30). In all this
discipline the empiric familiarity with facts is essential, and to this extent
wisdom was a secular asset, a gift of God perhaps, but to be cultivated by
human ingenuity and industry. This wisdom might be in the calculating
prudence of the careerist or political opportunist, the savoir faire or often the
unashamed expediency of the man whom Noth well characterizes as klug
(astute) rather than weise (wise), ja vielleicht schlau (indeed perhaps even
cunning) (Noth and Thomas [eds.] 1955: 233), a notable instance of which
was the cold cunning of Solomon to which David commended Shimei for
vengeance (1 Kgs 2.9). But the wise men (amm) who passed on the fruits
of their experience in the Davidic monarchy, for all their worldly wisdom,
were really interested in a stable society which was still, in spite of secular
developments in the monarchy, a development of the sacral community of
Israel. Thus they inculcated the well-tried social virtues of industry, moderation, sexual temperance and religious conformity, which best equipped the
individual to be successful because he was responsible and trusted in the
community, but also above all preserved that stability of society which was the
aim of the state. It must be emphasized that the questioning of the principles
conventionally recognized in religion and ethics, which is so distinctive a
feature respectively of Ecclesiastes and Job, was no part of Wisdom in this
early period of the history of Israel. People must accept the situation in state
and society as they found it, seeking by personal example to keep them true to
the traditional standards. Insofar as the situation might deteriorate, Ecclesiastes
and Job did not vainly inveigh, but counselled patience by sobriety and selfcontrol so that people might survive what they could not immediately amend,
or accept the situation with dignity, or even perhaps by their perseverance turn
the situation to legitimate account. This is the attitude of Job in the Prologue to
the Book, and of his friends in the Dialogue. The writer of the Dialogue
through Job is of course much more critical, since he has a much deeper
personal involvement.
In animadverting upon the fabric of society towards the end of the monarchy in Judah, Jeremiah (18.18) and Ezekiel (7.26) refer to revelation, divine
direction and counsel from prophets, priests and wise men (amm) respectively as vital to the guidance and indeed existence and coherence of the state.
Israel had come into being as a sacral community, a covenanted people chosen
as the instruments of Gods purpose. Its development therefore, whatever
secular factors it necessarily involved, was conditioned by the will of its God
interpreted through traditional experience conserved and expressed through
the institutions of religion, which was the function of the priests, or by fresh
revelation from God relevant to the contemporary situation, which was
1
The Book of Job
23
experienced by the prophet and communicated by him to the people. The

function of the sage (m) was humanistic. He was not the intermediary
between humans and God either objectively within the context of the cult as
the priest, nor as the direct mediator of an inspired dynamic word as the
prophet. To be sure, he felt that he, like the prophet, was guided by the Spirit
of God, which gave him insights beyond the common knowledge and prejudices of others; but his experience of the spirit of God did not, as in the case of
the prophet, involve him in the compulsive communication of an oracle. His
role was to analyse and assess the situation in society, primarily in Israel, but
also in a wider context. He was of course heir to the tradition of Israel as a
sacral community (von Rad 195861: I, 431) with its religious institutions and
prophetic communication of the will of God, and his function was to preserve
the well-tried social institutions and values, of which the sages of Israel gave
due notice in the dictum the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom
(Prov. 1.7; 9.10; cf. Job 28.28). However, he was neither ecclesiastic nor
prophet, but a shrewd, observant humanist in whom the spirit of God took the
form of sanctied sobriety. He studied society, deduced principles of conduct
both social and individual, and he related society to its environment in nature,
from which he deduced many sound principles which could be protably
applied in society. The references in Jeremiah and Ezekiel attribute counsel
(h) to the sage as the divine direction (trh) was the function of the priest
and the divine word (dr) was the province of the prophet. Counsel
(h), however, means more than advice though that is included. Counsel
relates also to the purpose of God and may actually denote it, as in Isa. 5.19;
19.17; 46.10; Psalm 33; Job 38.2; 42.3. It denotes also the ability to ascertain it
and mediate it and to carry it out. This was ideally the function and privilege
of the ancient king as Gods vassal or vice-gerent, so that y may be a royal
title (Pedersen 1926: 128), as in the royal titulary in Isa. 9.5 (EVV 6). Insight
into the divine plan and purpose and the function of carrying it into effect in
the community, though the duty of the royal vice-gerent, might also be
discharged by prophets admitted into Gods intimate counsel or by sages, who
at least in the Davidic monarchy worked to sustain the order in the state and
community of Israel, which was of course basically a sacral community. This
sober religious undertone in the wisdom of Israel which, for all its wealth of
utilitarian precepts, was formerly considered to be the characteristic of Hebrew
wisdom (Fichtner 1933: 87ff., 95ff., 123; Baumgartner 1933: 27), has been
well emphasized by Ringgren (1947: 127ff.; 1962: 10), von Rad (195861: I,
415ff.), Gese (1958: 33ff.) and H.H. Schmid (1966: 3ff.). It is well illustrated
in the Book of Job, where the writer, for all his trenchant criticism of the
answer of conventional wisdom and piety, feels his way to a solution in the
traditional religious experience of Israel.2 This is reected in his use of the
2. Baumgartner cites Job as an instance of later Hebrew Wisdom, which was strongly
impregnated with religion (1933: 27-29).
1
24
forms in which that experience was expressed, the Hymn of Praise, the Oath of
Purgation before God and the Plaint of the Sufferer,3 in the framework of
which his problem is posed and answered.
Thus the sage (m) in Israel sought by analysis of society in the context
of nature and history to discover the purpose of life, or perhaps we should say
to verify what religion revealed of that purpose, and to promote and coordinate
all forces conducive to it and to discourage all that militated against it.4 Thus,
in their own society of ancient Israel, the sages did what the priests did through
the law and what the prophets did through the word, all seeking, each in their
own way, to conserve an integrated society according to the will of its God.
The sages, however, were more involved in the practical and often mundane
problems of the realization of the integrated society. Heirs of the spiritual
tradition of Israel, they yet imposed on themselves the limitation of scientic
humanism in their moral philosophy, so far as that was possible for sober
persons in Israel, where the sages provision for a sound society had so largely
been anticipated by the priest and prophet since the settlement of Israel in
Palestine.
In spite of the involvement of the wise men of Israel in the practical
problems of the training of an administrative class, they were keenly interested
in the moral philosophy of the empiric order, both in the context of their
practical function and through their own interest in the fundamental problems
of lifean interest which they shared with the professional sages of Egypt.
Thus they looked at nature and society in broad perspective and, though aware
of the fact of suffering and unrequited sin in a world believed to be under the
wise and benevolent government of God Almighty, saw more to support the
traditional belief in Gods order (mip) than to contradict it.
So long as the state survived, the community integrated under the king as
Gods executive was a visible token of Gods order, where the traditional
communal ethic was upheld. However, on the collapse of the state and the
social order this traditional ethic with its balance in favour of the principle of
reward and retribution within Gods order could no longer be maintained on
traditional evidence. But customary views of life die hard, and the long-inured
sense of solidarity now found expression as a guilt-complex under which, after
the catastrophe of 586 BCE, people were content to accept fatalistically the fact
that they were doomed to suffer for their fathers sins. This attitude, which
paralysed moral effort, was apprehended by Ezekiel (ch. 18) as an outstanding
danger of his time, and his effort to emancipate the individual from the
3. A. Weiser (1959: 12) relates the thought of the writer in these to the religion of the
covenant-community of Israel, speaking of them as the reection of the writers personal
Drama of Salvation (persnlicher Heilsgeschichte). This is none the less true even where
those forms are adapted, or even parodied, in Job.
4. So in Egypt de Buck (1922) stresses the purpose of wisdom to recognize and sustain
maat, or Order. H.H. Schmid (1966: 20-24) goes further, maintaining that the cultivation
and propagation of wisdom had a creative function with respect to maat.
1
The Book of Job
25
trammels of this morality must have been supported by the rediscovery of the
Prophets with their critical attitude to institutions, their moral discrimination
and their qualication of the current social ethic by their doctrine of the
responsive remnant as the object of Gods grace in the general doom of the
people.
It was natural that in this period Hebrew Wisdom should have endeavoured
to apply the principles of the traditional Hebrew ethic, with its insistence on
condign rewards and punishments to the individual, as Ezekiel had done in his
modication of the principle the fathers have eaten sour grapes and the
childrens teeth are set on the edge. But however generally applicable this
principle might be in effect, even in the case of the individual, its universal
validity was obviously impaired by the sufferings of individuals beyond their
deserts. The fate of the Jews after the fall of Jerusalem and the triumph of the
materialistic power and policy of paganism itself suggests the nal inadequacy
of the traditional doctrine of reward and punishment.
The inadequacy of the traditional ethic, already felt in certain psalms of the
type the Plaint of the Sufferer and by Jeremiah (e.g. 12.1-2), was exposed
notably by the writer of the Book of Job, which marks a new departure in
Hebrew Wisdom. The writer reaches the positive conclusion that suffering
beyond ones deserts bears no invariable relationship to the traditional doctrine
of the theodicy and implies no alienation from God, who is still accessible to
humans. The sage in Job is sufciently faithful to the sapiential tradition to
counsel not rebellion on the basis of human ego-centric interest and limited
knowledge and experience, but acceptance of the situation under the providence of God (of which nature beyond human control or interest provides so
many instances) and is prepared to move forward to the ever-fresh encounter
with God in response to which humans gain fuller knowledge of the divine
nature and purpose. For this purpose, Gods intelligent master-plan which
motivated his creation (the okmh of Prov. 8.22-31; Job 11.6, 13, 20; 15.8;
28.12ff.) was the business of the sage in Israel to discern in nature and society
not only as a clue to the ultimate truth, but as the guide to the practical fullment of the life of the individual and society by the legitimate use of lifes
opportunities in maximum cooperation with the Creator. But the master-key to
the knowledge of the purpose of God insofar as it could be known to humanity
was the living experience of God himself.
Job is associated with Proverbs and Ecclesiastes in the Wisdom literature of
the OT. Apart from a general afnity between the poem on Wisdom in Job 28,
which is an interpolation in the Book of Job, and the poem on Wisdom as
Gods instrument in creation in Prov. 8.22-31 in the latest section of Proverbs,
there is little matter for comparative dating common to Job and Proverbs.
Nowhere in Proverbs is there a strenuous and sustained preoccupation with a
fundamental theme as in Job. Generally such coherence as there is in Proverbs
is in the praise of Wisdom, which in the pre-exilic sections of the book is that
empirical ability to assess a situation which on its more mundane level
1
26
amounts to practical savoir faire as a key to success in business or administration and on its higher level keeps a person patient in adversity and prevents
one compromising ones ideals in a hasty judgment which may abet moral
perversity. With this prudential wisdom the writer of Job, with his agonizing
problem, has little in common, though as a result of his experience and his
ultimate confrontation with God we see that the writer of Job knew the
signicance of patience in suffering which the sages of Israel taught. From the
criticisms of Ecclesiastes we may gather that there were various schools of
wisdom among the Jews and various methods of philosophic engagement and
communication. Ecclesiastes at the end of the fourth century BCE certainly had
its more orthodox contemporaries, whose views are represented probably in
the rst book of Proverbs (chs. 19). Possibly there were more critical views at
all periods when wisdom ourished, but in the pre-exilic sections of Proverbs
there is no evidence of them, and the view of sin and retribution, virtue and
reward which dominates Proverbs is probably a fair index to the dominant
philosophy of the sages throughout the Hebrew monarchy. On the basis of
experience, the author of Job, like Ecclesiastes, questions the hitherto predominating wisdom tradition, exposing its inadequacy in ruthless dialectic. To
hymns of praise extolling Gods order in nature and society Job opposes hymns
of praise emphasizing the destructive aspect of the rule of God; to didactic
poems on the end of the wicked he opposes similar poems on the prosperity of
the wicked and the hopeless misery of the poor. He cites edifying proverbs on
the theme of sin and retribution and exposes their inadequacy in the light of
hard facts. The self-sufciency of the sages in Proverbs, however, in their
practical commission, should not disguise the fact that they were aware of the
ultimate imponderables in Gods purpose for his creation. To say nothing of
the implications of the hymn on Wisdom as Gods instrument in creation
(Prov. 8.22-31), the theme recurs even in the wisdom of the monarchic period
that humans may propose and strive for an end with all their resources and
energies but it is God who ultimately disposes in his higher wisdom (Prov.
12.15; 16.1, 2, 25; 21.2). But the preoccupation of the sages with the practical
task of education led to their emphasis on the pragmatic potentiality of humans
in society. The preoccupation with the problem of the worthy sufferer in Job,
however, which called the doctrine of condign punishment and reward in
question, occasions a greater emphasis on the ultimate purpose of Gods
creation which is ultimately beyond human knowledge and control. In the arguments of Jobs three friends this is invoked as an argument for patience in
suffering and suspension of judgment in the situation of the worthy sufferer or
the apparent impunity of the wicked, or it is used as a rebuke to the presumption of Job to criticize the prevailing doctrine of the theodicy. It is used in the
statements of Job in the Dialogue to emphasize the transcendence of God
beyond all meaningful contact with humans. But ultimately in the authors
conclusion in the Divine Declaration it is used, illustrated by instances of
Gods benecent providence in nature beyond human control and apart from
1
The Book of Job
27
his convenience, to inspire in the worthy sufferer a new hope, beyond the
salutary but inadequate doctrine of retribution and reward, that in the living
encounter with the Creator one may discover more of the purpose of life and
new tokens of the care of ones God.
Faith in Gods moral government and the optimism of current piety had
already been questioned, probably during the monarchy, in the psalms which
voice the plaint of the community or of the individual on behalf of the
community, and which may have been part of the royal liturgy in public fast
and penitence. Here the sufferings of the subject were stated, usually with a
protestation of innocence; the subject then turned to God and declared ones
faith, rendered thanks either for deliverance or in anticipation of it, or else
would vow a vow of thanksgiving. The detailed and cumulative enumeration
of sufferings, often gurative and hyperbolic, probably derives ultimately from
primitive counter-incantations, which are extant in Mesopotamian texts, an
essential feature of which was the counteraction of malicious spells by the use
of corresponding terms. In the context of the Hebrew Psalms, however, the
detailed list of the sufferings enhances the power and grace of God in deliverance experienced or hoped for. Often, however, they express the agony of the
subject not merely under the stroke of sufferings, but in doubt of Gods moral
government. This is the problem of the author of Job, who makes extensive
use of the literary type we have just described, a fact which should warn us
against the literalistic or biographical interpretation of the poetic dialogue in
the book. Unfortunately, it is not possible to date the psalms of this type
precisely and while the convention was established during the monarchy (e.g.
Ps. 44) it continued long after the Exile.
Psalms of this type, which pose a moral problem to conventional faith, were
peculiarly suited to the moral philosophy of the sages of Israel, and Psalms 37
and 49, which like Job show concern about the suffering of the innocent and
the prosperity of the wicked, are either sapiential productions or individual
thanksgivings, psalms and prayers which have been inuenced by the thought
and form of wisdom literature. Here, however, the moral problem is not a
scandal to faith as in the argument in Job. The prosperity of the wicked is
admitted, but it is only for a season and their end is miserable. This is echoed
in the arguments of Jobs friends, for example, Bildad in the gure of the plant
on stony ground which wilts with sunrise (8.16-18) and the statement of
Zophar 20.4ff.:
That the jubilation of the wicked is but for a short time,
And the joy of the impious but for a moment.
Compare Prov. 24.19-20:

Fret not yourselves because of evil-doers,
And be not envious of the wicked,
For the evil man has no future,
And the lamp of the wicked is put out.
1
28
The last saying is cited by Bildad with approval (Job 18.5-6) and questioned
by Job as belied by experience (21.17). The moral scandal of the prosperity of
the ungodly, which Job states at length (e.g. 21.7-21), is posed as a problem to
the pious in Psalm 73, who confesses that it has been a problem only to
humanist philosophy (Ps. 73.2-3, 15-16, 21-22), to be solved in communion
with God in worship and in sacrament (Ps. 73.17). The intensely personal
character of this psalm suggests a comparatively late period after the rebuilding of the Temple in 516 BCE. It is thus of limited use for the dating of the
Book of Job, but the two indicate the intensication of the moral problem of
the prosperity of the wicked and the suffering of the innocent, and though the
psalmist poses the problem and nds the solution within the context of the
cult, which the author of the Book of Job as a humanist denies himself, both
reach assurance in communion with God.
The problem of the suffering of the innocent had thus been already set in
focus and all the adaptation required by the author of Job was simply to
withhold the statement of faith and thanksgiving characteristic of the Plaint of
the Sufferer. He thus questions traditional piety as well as traditional ethics,
orthodox religion as well as orthodox philosophy, which is done with less
intensity, but with more nesse, in Ecclesiastes. The tremendous seriousness
of the challenge of the writer of Job to orthodox faith and wisdom and his
intense concentration and involvement in contrast to the scientic detachment
and diffuse interest of the gentle cynic Ecclesiastes suggests the priority of
the writer of Job as the rst major thinker seriously to challenge orthodox
belief in Israel.
Although the Book of Job is rightly grouped with Proverbs and Ecclesiastes
in the OT and is as practical as the former and as critical of orthodox faith and
ethics as the latter, it transcends the limits of a strictly sapiential work. Like
Ecclesiastes and unlike Proverbs Job is concentrated on a single theme, a
mans reaction to unmerited suffering, believed to be caused directly by God.
The problem of Job is the paradox of a man created in the image of God, tried
beyond endurance yet not allowed to understand the reason or purpose of his
suffering or to enjoy the relief of death he so earnestly desired, the natural
object of Gods special care yet the butt of afiction (Job 7.17-21; cf. Ps. 8), a
potential blessing to society (ch. 29), yet having his effectiveness crippled by
his calamity which encourages the worst elements, who defy Gods order (ch.
30). But, unlike the Book of Ecclesiastes, Job is not the reection of lectures in
the schools in spite of the form of sapiential controversy in which much of the
book is cast. There is in fact a distinctive character about the Book of Job that
has led a number of scholars5 to question its nature as a typical sapiential
5. E.g. P. Volz (1911: 25ff.), J. Fichtner (1933), J. Baumgartner (1933: 187ff.). M.

Buttenwieser (1922: 38-40) characterized Job as a drama of the human soul rather than a
wisdom text, and C. Kuhl (in RGG3, col. 359) declares that the Book of Job is not primarily
a wisdom text but carmen sui generis, expressing the experience of its author. The same
1
The Book of Job
29
work. If, as Ecclesiastes, Job poses a problem, the fact of suffering in what
faith declares to be the wise and benecent economy of Almighty God, that is
not suffering as such nor even the suffering of a worthy man objectively
considered; it is rather, as Westermann (1956: 2ff.) has noted, the agonizing of
a worthy man on his personal sufferings, and to this the academic question is
strictly secondary, a situation which is reected in the literary form which
predominates in these parts of the book where Job expresses himself, namely
the Plaint of the Sufferer, which Volz so strongly stressed in stating the poet
has not written a treatise but a plaint (Volz 1911: 26). This is cited with
approval by Westermann (1956: 3), who goes on to emphasize the character of
Jobs statement in chs. 3 and 2931 as a Plaint of the Sufferer, which is mainly
the character of Jobs part in the Dialogue proper in chs. 427, which Westermann after Bentzen characterizes as the dramatization of the Plaint of the
Sufferer, as envisaged in Pss. 41.10 and 51.13ff. (1956: 5f.).6
We should agree with this general assessment, though in its minimizing the
element of disputation in the speeches of Job in favour of the Plaint of the
Sufferer we must not be inuenced by the mere lack of theses and antitheses in
the Dialogue according to the method of Western logic. This is after all not the
method of Oriental disputation, which depends on repeated and increasing
emphasis of its point with variation of expression rather than on logical argument, as Khler rightly observed (1953: 153), and though Jobs statements are
predominantly in the style of the Plaint of the Sufferer they are nonetheless
poignant citations of fact in indictment of the traditional doctrine of the divine
economy urged by the friends. Nevertheless it is fair to say that the sapiential
controversy, conducted often in the style of forensic debate, is more distinctive
of the speeches of the friends and of Gods reply than of the statements of Job,
though even here the convention of legal or sapiential disputation is more
marked in the introduction to the statements of the three friends and of God
than in the substance, as Khler has done well to note (p. 156). As the book
proceeds, the statements of Job give increasingly the impression less of a
disputation than of the audible reection of the author, who at all points
reects his nurture in the religion of Israel, thinking aloud and voicing his
experience in great spiritual travail. Thus Jobs replies to his friends repeatedly
terminate in questions, expostulations and prayers to God (e.g. 7; 9.25-31; 10;
13.20-28; 14.13-22). Even in the rst round of debate (chs. 413), where Job
appraisal is given by C. Westermann (1956) and S. Terrien, who states le hros se rebelle
et devient un prophte (1963: 41).
6. Westermann, correctly in our opinion, understands the speeches of Jobs three
friends, despite their predominant literary character of sapiential disputation, as intended for
Jobs comfort and so understood by him throughout (13.4; 16.25; 21.2, 24; 26.2-4), giving
the sufferer the opportunity to relieve his feelings and, we should add, being apologetic for
the divine economy in moral principles even in suffering, which despite its limitations in
the mechanical doctrine of retribution offers more encouragement than the view that
humanity is at the mercy of blind chance.
1
30
srebuts the orthodox arguments of his friends, the writer is more and more
concerned with Jobs relationship to God and less with doctrine about God and
human suffering. The friends and their doctrine recede more and more into the
background, leaving Job increasingly in isolation with God, who alone and in
such concentrated and exclusive fellowship can give the answer to the innocent sufferer.
Here we may prot from the study of Baumgrtel (1933), who, though
rather too severely limiting what he terms the original dialogue to one round
of debate between Job and his three friends (which is included in the rst
round of the extant book, with a monologue from Job of which Baumgrtel
nds vestiges in 16.6, 9, 12-17, 18-21; 19.1-29; 23.2-7, 10-17; 31.35, 37), has
succeeded in bringing the problem of the book into clear focus. As a result we
see that the book has both an academic and an existential aspect, reecting the
inuence of the current doctrine of retribution on the thinking and faith of the
author. His mouthpiece Job thinks as much in the context of that doctrine as
his friends, as was natural considering the fact that it was of the essence of the
faith of Israel inculcated in the tradition of the will and nature of God revealed
in the covenant experience and sacrament and expressed in the message of the
prophets and in the fast-liturgy. Thus the author through Job accepts the fact
that in the divine economy sin occasions suffering. Maintaining his innocence,
Job in effect exposes the logical fallacy of his friends in concluding that all
suffering is occasioned by the sin of the sufferer, supporting his thesis by
sharp criticism of the traditional view of the theodicy expressed in current
proverbs and didactic poems in the sapiential tradition on the basis of the
known facts both of unmerited suffering and unrequited sin. Job, however,
holding, as he and his contemporaries did, that God was immediately responsible for his sufferings, commits the same logical error as his friends in arguing
from his sufferings to, if not sin, then what God had imputed to him as sin,
falsely as his conscience assures him. It is this logical fallacy in the application
of the current doctrine of retribution that raises the academic problem of the
book. However, on the same principle, Jobs consciousness of his innocence
leads him to appeal to God for a direct confrontation in the rm conviction
that, from all that tradition had taught him of the nature of God, he would be
acquitted and indeed that God himself would sanction his vindication (16.19f.;
19.25f.; 23.6f.). Though this is a logical conclusion to the premises of the
traditional belief in the nature of God on the basis of what was believed to be
his own revelation and of Jobs innocence, it was, in the face of the former
conclusion, equally logical, that God who had aficted him had unjustly condemned him, an act of faith. It is this persistent, growing faith that makes the
Book of Job more than a sapiential exercise, richer and more serious than a
mere academic criticism of the current doctrine of the theodicy.
It is in Jobs nal appeal to God (chs. 2931), to whom also ch. 3 is less
directly addressed, as Westermann well emphasizes (1956: 6), that the true
character of the Book of Job is to be recognized. The sapiential disputations of
1
The Book of Job
31
Jobs three friends, though sustained rather by intensifying emotion than by

progressive argumentation, the introduction to Jobs statements in the same
literary convention, his replies in the same style and in ch. 29 the forensic
form of his nal appeal to God, put the book into the formal category of sapiential literature, which is recognized by its expansion in the poem on wisdom
(ch. 28) and the review and supplementation of arguments in the Elihu addendum (chs. 3237). But within this category the book is sui generis; the author
is personally committed to a degree unparalleled in Hebrew Wisdom literature.
His book is no didactic treatise, however earnest; it is the direct reection of
the most intense spiritual experience of a soul in ordeal, beyond the help of
any impersonal system of theology, whose life and hope can be renewed only
in renewed fellowship with God himself. Well may Weiser describe the Book
of Job as this unique book which the poet has written in his own hearts
blood.7
The personal involvement of the sage moreover has elated the poet, so that
we have in this book no mere transcript of some polemical discourses of wise
men The book gives rather a sublimation of that sort of thing. There were
poets at that time in Israel, and one of them touched the experience of such a
crisis with his magic wand (Kraeling 1938: 24). The result is a singular
monument of poetic genius, which in its detail and general impression has
continued to arrest thinking people and to evoke admiration throughout the
ages.
7. Weiser 1959: 10; cf. J. Strahan 1913: 13: His theology is charged with whitehot
emotion, and emits ashes of prophecy, an appraisal which recalls that of S. Terrien (see
above, n. 6).
1
Chapter 4
DATE AND PROVENANCE
The obvious terminus post quem for the Book of Job is the conception of the
n in the Prologue, still a supernatural gure in an ofcial capacity of
public prosecutor under the permissive will of God as in Zech. 3.1 and an
intelligence agent who ranges through the world (cf. Zech. 1.10), which is
verbally reected in Job 1.7. This establishes a terminus post quem for the
narrative framework of the book c. 520 BCE. The afnity of 42.12ff. with the
Pentateuch in its P recension might suggest a later date, in the fth or even the
fourth century.1 This, however, is a midrashic expansion to the Epilogue, of
which 11QtargJob from the latter half of the second century BCE2 takes no
notice, so that it is of no relevance for the date of the denitive Book of Job. If
the Prologue gives evidence of a terminus post quem both for the narrative and
for the Dialogue, however, it is not so easy to date the Dialogue precisely. If
indeed 19.23f. refers to the inscription of Darius I (521486 BCE) on the rock
of Behistun, the evidence would carry us no further than the reference to the
n in the Prologue. Given the likelihood of an Israelite version of an older
Job tradition of the narrative framework (see below, pp. 56-75), with which
Ezekiel (14.20) was familiar3 in the early half of the sixth century BCE, it is
likely that the nal version if the present Prologue was the work of the sage
who developed the Dialogue.
The language of the Dialogue does not settle the question of the date.
Granted, there is a substantial element of Aramaic in grammatical forms and
vocabulary, which might be expected in the Persian period in the sixth century
BCE. However, the Aramaic and Syriac words (which elucidate Hebrew words
which as such are out of place in the context by the canons of what was
1. O. Eissfeldt (1965: 208) dates the P recension of the Pentateuch after the Deuteronomistic History and Malachi (c. 470 BCE) but before Chronicles (c. 350 BCE) and the
whole Pentateuch including P by the time of Nehemiah on the evidence of Neh. 89 (398
BCE).
2. Van der Ploeg and van der Woude 1971. A study of the script indicated a date in the
first half of the first century CE, while a comparison of grammatical forms with Daniel and
the Genesis Apocryphon from Qumran (first century CE) indicates a date for the work as
distinct from the manuscript in the first half of the second century BCE.
3. Suggested by the association of Job with Noah and Danel [sic], hence with the
Ugaritic tradition.
1
The Book of Job
33
familiar in Hebrew philology) and Arabic and Ugaritic words (which have the
same effect) indicate that such cases need signify no more than homonyms in
Hebrew which have not so far been recognized in the substantial, though
limited, range of Classical Hebrew.
The thought of the Dialogue with relation to other parts of the OT may
possibly suggest a date, though this question must be handled with reservation.
The OT, despite a certain unity of outlook, is not a book bearing on one theme
progressively developed in which the parts are merely in disarray, but a library
which reects the predominating interests of its various authors with relevance
to their several situations. Nevertheless, at certain times crucial issues emerge.
Thus the attitude of the writer of Job to the doctrine of sin and retribution
suggests a time when that was being questioned. Ezekiels questioning of the
traditional view of communal as distinct from personal retribution (Ezek. 18.24) seems to be re-echoed in Job 21.19-21, quoting the conventional doctrine
that God stores up iniquity for their sons and adding Let him requite the
man himself that he may feel it. The mitigation of the traditional mechanical
view of sin and retribution in the more positive conception that God has no
pleasure in the death of the wicked but that he should turn from his way and
live (Ezek. 18.2) indicates the same conclusion. The disciplinary signicance
of suffering towards amendment is also emphasized in Isa. 40.2 (cf. Job 5.17
and 33.16ff. in the Elihu addendum). Ezekiels preoccupation with those
questions became more urgent after the fall of the state in 586 BCE, and the
mood of the time is reected in the Deuteronomistic History, which was
completed after 561 BCE.4 The problem of the suffering of the object of Gods
particular notice would certainly have particular point after the liquidation of
the Covenant community,5 and the nostalgic picture of the security and
prosperity of the community integrated in the blessing of the chief so
movingly drawn in Job 296 reects the sense of loss so acutely felt after the
fall of Jerusalem, when the poet in Lam. 4.20 declares:
The breath of our nostrils, the Lords anointed
Was taken in their pits,
He of whom we said, Under his shadow
We shall live among the nations!
The urgency of the problem of the suffering of the innocent and the
prosperity of the ungodly, which upset the belief in the doctrine of sin and
retribution, virtue and reward, nds piquant expression in Jeremiah and
Habakkuk (e.g. 1.3), and imagery in certain passages in Job (3.3ff.; 10.18-22;
21ff.) and Jeremiah (20.14-18; 12.1-3) might suggest a date for the Book of
4. Indicated by the reference in 2 Kgs 25.27 to the accession of Awil-Marduk in that
year.
5. Cf. the view that Job is the personification of Israel in the Exile, supported by
Kraeling 193940; Susman 1946.
6. J. Pedersens fine study of this passage (1926: 213-16) should be noted.
1
4. Date and Provenance
34
Job near the time of Jeremiah (rst half of the sixth century BCE or soon after).
But both writers drew on a common source, the Plaint of the Sufferer (e.g. Ps.
10.12-22) and the fast-liturgy with application in the Wisdom tradition (e.g.
Pss. 37, 49 and 73), which were familiar in Israel throughout the Monarchy
and were attested in Mesopotamia since the second millennium BCE.7
On the problem of the suffering of the innocent in Job Terrien has stressed
that no notice was taken of vicarious suffering, which nds its classical expression in the servant Songs in Deutero-Isaiah (especially Isa. 52.1353.12), and
concludes that the book of Job was anterior to this passage (Terrien 1963:
28f.). However, the prophet addresses a challenge to the community to exploit
its humiliation by fullling in itself the former function of the king in rites of
penance for the community; the author of Job is agonizing over a personal
problem. He is concerned with the reason and the signicance of suffering
only insofar as he rejects the mechanical doctrine that it is the natural and
inevitable consequence of sin. True to the traditional function of the sage in
Israel and the Near East, he is interested primarily in the practical question of
the reaction of a worthy man to suffering in a world believed to be under the
wise, just and benecent rule of God. He is concerned with the discipline of
the individual to avoid hasty and impassioned judgment and to maintain ones
faith and dignity even under the stroke of unmerited afiction, realizing that
there were tokens of a higher Order under Providence by faith in which one
might learn to endure ones lot. We cannot then admit the absence of the
doctrine of atonement through vicarious suffering in the Book of Job as a
reason for dating the Book before Deutero-Isaiah.
Dhorme adduces the analogy between the Book of Malachi (c. 450 BCE)
and Job in the embarrassment of even the pious before the prosperity of the
ungodly, for instance, in Mal. 2.17 and 3.13-15:
You have said, It is vain to serve God.
And what is the good of our keeping his charges,
Or of walking in mourning before Yahweh of Hosts?
Henceforth we consider the arrogant blessed,
Yea, evil-doers prosper,
Yea, they even put God to the test and escape.
This is, signicantly, the prophets complaint of the faithless conduct of

commonalty, and not the daring questioning of the critical philosopher. Orthodoxy represented by Jobs friends had not yet dared to press the embarrassing
fact of the prosperity of the wicked. This might suggest a terminus ante quem
for Jobs daring dmarche, before the addition of the Elihu speeches (chs. 32
37) and probably the poems on Behemoth (40.15-24, 31-32; 41.1-3) and
Leviathan (40.25-30; 41.4-26 [EVV 40.25-30; 41.1-6, 12-34]).
If we may revert to the evidence of the n in the Prologue, we would
stress that, sinister as he may be, he is not yet n of 1 Chron. 21.1, which
7. See above, pp. 5-20.
1
The Book of Job
35
would suggest a terminus ante quem for the Book of Job c. 350 BCE. We might
further suggest that Jobs trenchant criticism of the doctrine of sin and retribution, virtue and reward, mark a protest against the tendency to over-stress the
doctrine, which crystallizes in its mechanical application in Chronicles in the
untimely fate of the good King Uzziah whose leprosy was said to be the
consequence of his infringement of priestly ofces (2 Chron. 26.16-19), the
captivity of the reprobate Manasseh (2 Chron. 33.1-11) and his restoration to
Judah after prayer (2 Chron. 33.12f.) and the untimely death of the reforming
King Josiah since he refused, the Chronicler alleges, to believe the claim of his
antagonist Pharaoh Necho of a divine commission from Yahweh in his
expedition against the Babylonians (2 Chron. 38.21-24).
On such evidence we conclude that the Book of Job, excluding the later
addenda of the Elihu section (chs. 3237), and the poems on Behemoth and
Leviathan, and 42.12ff., which we regard as a midrashic expansion, was substantially composed between 450 and 350 BCE. Such amplications as the
Elihu speeches and the midrashic expansion indicate continued preoccupation
with the denitive Book. This may be reected in the Wisdom poems (e.g.
24.13-18) and hymns of praise (e.g. 25.2-6; 26.5-14) and the poem on Wisdom
(ch. 28), which intervenes between Eliphazs arraignment of Job (ch. 22) and
Jobs reply (ch. 23), Jobs nal protest of innocence to his friends on oath (ch.
27), his apologia pro vita sua (ch. 29), his nal plaint (ch. 30) and his oath of
purgation (ch. 31) before the Divine Declaration (38.239.30; 40.1, 7-14).
Beside the date of the Book in relation to the general literary deposit and
particular sapiential tradition of Israel, the question of local provenance is
rather academic. To limit the evidence to the Prologue, Dialogue and Divine
Declaration, the references to vines and olives (24.10f.), the migrant stork
(39.13) and hawk (39.26) would indicate Palestine. The writers familiarity
with snow, ice, hail (38.22-38) and winter torrents swollen with melting snow
might suggest the Lebanon or Anti-Lebanon. Tur-Sinai, unduly, we consider,
claiming an Aramaic original subsequently rendered into Hebrew, claimed a
Mesopotamian provenance. To be sure, there are many references to Mesopotamian mythology throughout the book, for example Marduks mastery of
Rahab and monstrous allies (9.13), the land of no return (10.21), with the
gates and gate-keepers of death (38.17), the foundation of the earth on the
lower deep (38.4) and the possible reference to the inscription of Darius I on
the rock of Behistun (19.23f.). This Mesopotamian matter, however, was
known to Hebrew poets and nds expression more and less in the prophets and
Psalms, while familiarity with the Behistun inscription may be owing to Jewish merchants on their trading ventures.
A. Guillaume contended for provenance from the Hejaz (1963, 1964a,
1964b). The setting is indeed in the land of Uz, conceivably in the Hejaz,
with the imminent possibility of the sudden ghazzu, which left Job destitute
(1.15-17), with other ock-masters in the Dialogue (15.21). The possible identication of the Sabaeans (1.15) with tribesmen from the Wadi Sheb in the
1
36
Hezaz and the raid by the Kasdim, possibly garrison troops such as Nabonaid
actually settled in the Hejaz, seems to reect a historical situation, if only to
lend verisimilitude to the setting in the land of Uz. This land was traditionally associated with Edom and with wisdom, selected by the Hebrew sage to
emphasize the independence of the cult and revealed religion in Israel in the
solution of moral problems. The writer is obviously familiar with the landscape of the desert and its oases, with his references to the caravans of Teima
and Sheba (6.18-20), the ibex (39.1) and the onager (39.13-18). There was
certainly a Jewish settlement at Teima in the sixth century BCE, to which the
Prayer of Nabonaid from Qumran refers (Milik 1956), which was highly
populated and inuential in the Hejaz in the time of Muhammad. But here
again all detail can be explained on the assumption of caravan trade through
the region, to which Ps. 107.4 refers. In fact all those local references necessarily do no more than indicate that the writer of Job and his circle were one
way and another familiar with the Near East from the Hejaz to Egypt and
Syria and even Iran, which was traversed by caravans, with which the writer or
some of his circle may have travelled.
We must, to a certain extent, admit Guillaumes case for the very substantial number of words in Job, where the meaning of the text, obscure by the
canons of Classical Hebrew, has been elucidated through Arabic cognates,
especially in pairs of seemingly identical words in parallelism. However, in
such cases the Arabic word which restores the obvious sense may be no more
than the cognate of a Hebrew homonym so far unknown, or at least unrecognized by scholars in the limited corpus of extant Hebrew literature. Such
Hebrew words, not only in Job but throughout the OT, may be elucidated by
the recognition of cognates in Akkadian, Aramaic, and Syriac and Ugaritic.
Not only so, but the recognition of Arabic cognates to Ugaritic words from
the fourteenth century BCE severely modies Guillaumes conclusion. For
instance, the stock title of El in the Ras Shamra texts lpn il dpid corresponds
verbally to Arabic allhu l-laf dh fid (Allah the Kindly, the Compassionate).
A stronger case might be made for the composition of the Book in Egypt.
From the latter days of Jeremiah, Egypt was known as the home of most of the
inuential Jews who remained after the deportations to Babylon, and here
Jewish literature tradition ourished, including the Wisdom tradition represented by the grandson of Ben Sira, who settled in Egypt and translated his
grandfathers work after 132 BCE. By the same token of course the work of
Ben Sira himself attests the activity of sapiential circles in Palestine in the
third century. Given the activity of Jeremiah in Egypt and the interest in the
preservation of his work it may be no coincidence that Jobs curse on the day
of his birth (3.3-11) should so clearly echo Jer. 20.14-18. The conception of
sleep and repose in the grave for which Job longs recalls the plaint of him who
was weary of life (ANET 3, 407, cf. 33). Jobs puzzling declaration, Naked I
came from my mothers womb and naked I shall go back thither (ammh),
1
The Book of Job
37
nds its best explanation in our opinion in the Egyptian reference to death as
yon place (ANET 3, 34). The same passage in Job (3.14f.) refers to the burial
of kings and counsellors, who built arb for themselves, possibly places
in the desert, the pyramids on the desert plateau beyond the cultivable strip of
the Nile Valley or the well-furnished tombs (houses of eternity)8 of the
Pharaohs and their ofcials in the desert Valley of the Kings at Luxor. In view
of the age-old profession of grave-robbing, the rich contents of such tombs
(3.15) might be familiar to the author of Job. The watch kept over the tombs of
the notables (21.32) is also explicable in view of tomb-robbery. The allusion
to the long cortge of such a burial (21.32) could well reect specically the
Egyptian wisdom text which contrasts the cortge of the dead notable, including rich grave-offerings, with the corpse of the poor man carried out without
ceremony on a reed mat. Again Jobs wish to be weighed in a just balance
that God might know his integrity might well reect the scene from the
Egyptian Book of the Dead, where the soul of the defunct is weighed against
the feather of Maat, Truth (ANEP, pl. 639). In the gure of the reed (papyrus)
ourishing so long as it is rooted in the marsh Egyptian words are used
gme (Egyptian kmi) and au (Egyptian h h)and the reference to reedskiffs (9.26; cf. Isa. 18.2) surely refers to such craft on the Nile, which are well
attested in ancient Egyptian painting and tomb sculpture (Breasted 1917). The
reference to the wisdom of u, for which the parallel ew (cock)
indicates a bird, the ibis sacred to the wise god Thoth (Egyptian dhwi), the
activity of which is associated with the vital Nile ood, points in the same
direction, though the plethora of creatures of the desert and the migrant birds
of Palestine suggests an origin in a comprehensive bestiary of the same
category as the classied lists of natural phenomena such as those including
Solomons encyclopaedic nature lore (1 Kgs 4.33), which probably derived
from such lists in Egypt.9 In the description of the nature and habitat of the
hippopotamus (Behemoth) and the crocodile (Leviathan), the name behmo is
not as generally in Hebrew beasts or beast par excellence; it is a Hebrew
transliteration of Egyptian p ihmw (river-ox), while in the introduction to
the passage on Leviathan Can you draw out (tim) Leviathan? (40.25 [EVV
41.1]) there is probably a wordplay between the Hebrew verb and the ancient
Egyptian word for crocodile, which has survived in Coptic imsa, whence
the loanword in Arabic timsa. Finally, in a description of the crocodiles eyes
like the beams of the rising sun (41.10 [EVV 18]) we note Fohrers observation
that the crocodiles eyes were the hieroglyphic sign for the beams of the rising
sun (Fohrer 1989: 530 n. 9). Moreover, propos of the statement that the
crocodile is king over other beasts (41.26 [EVV 34]) it is signicant that the
8. So Dhorme, ad loc., who, with Budde, Duhm, G.B. Gray, Stevenson, Weiser and
Fohrer, thinks of the pyramids. G.R. Driver (1950d: 349) however, cites Ethiopic and S.
Arab. mrb (castle).
9. Gardiner 1949. For similar lists see Matous 1933 and von Soden 1934.
1
38
crocodile was the hieroglyphic sign for king (Erman 1894: 180). Although
the passages on Behemoth and Leviathan are later addenda to the denitive
Book of Job, which may indicate a recension in Egypt, there is strong evidence
for Humberts view of the Egyptian provenance of the denitive Book (1929:
75-105).
When all this is said, however, we should emphasize strongly that the local
provenance has but supercial bearing on the distinctive thought of the book.
There were by the Persian period settlements of Jews in Egypt, Mesopotamia,
Syria and Lebanon and the caravan towns of the Hejaz, with known literary
interests in Mesopotamia and Egypt. But, wherever they might be and
whatever calling they might adopt as holding no land, like the Murashu Sons
of Nippur with their far-ung trading and nancial interests, or those with
similar interests in the Hejaz, like the later Arab Quraish in Mecca, their real
cultural and spiritual home was the tradition of their Hebrew scriptures. In
comparison with the odd reection of possible physical background, the
familiarity with the Law, the Prophets and their own Wisdom tradition
(attested in verbal citation, literary types, their characteristic expressions and
association of ideas), used so naturally to reinforce the arguments of Job and
his interlocutors, and the development of the mature thought of their Hebrew
forebear, reduces any inuence of their physical environment to the minimum
and makes the question of the local provenance of the Book of Job merely
academic.
Chapter 5
LITERARY FORMS IN THE BOOK OF JOB
The Book of Job has an aesthetic appeal and an arresting power far beyond
any other known work of Hebrew Wisdom. Like Ecclesiastes, but unlike
Proverbs, the Wisdom of Solomon or Ben Sira, it is preoccupied by a single
central theme and it arrests by its bold and realistic challenge to accepted
dogma. In Job, however, unlike Ecclesiastes, the challenge is presented not in
academic detachment with the faint personal note of mild regret or of gentle
cynicism, but as the expression of intense personal conict between faith and
experience. This tension nds dramatic expression in work which by its
dramatic form, its deep concern with a central issue, its serious and realistic
questioning of conventional thought and faith, has been aptly compared to the
tragedies of Euripides.1
Job is a sapiential work dramatically presented in which the interest of the
reader is engaged by the literary art of the drama, the swift succession of
scenes in the Prologue set alternatively in heaven and earth, with the crescendo
account of Jobs calamities, culminating in his exemplary declaration of faith
(2.10):
If we accept good from God
Shall we not accept calamity?
We nd the good man at the nadir of his experience cursing the day he was
born and content to renounce life as meaningless (ch. 3). In response Eliphaz
intervenes in the normal role of the sage who seeks to adjust others to their
circumstances and convince them that calamity is not a fortuitous accident to
which they are helplessly and hopelessly exposed, but betokens Gods
government according to regular moral principles, according to which humans
may protect themselves (chs. 45). The drama is continued in the cut and
1. So H.M. Kallen (1918), who regarded the book as the imitation of a tragedy of
Euripides. Since the rst tragedy of Euripides was produced in 455 BCE it is unlikely that
the inuence of Euripides had time or opportunity to penetrate to the Near East during the
Persian period in which we should date the denitive Book of Job and probably its
recensions. Actually in Mesopotamian Wisdom literature and in the Hebrew Plaint of the
Sufferer there were native Semitic prototypes, so that in our opinion the afnity claimed
with the tragedies of Euripides, though strikingwithout being completeis fortuitous.
1
40
5. Literary Forms in the Book of Job
thrust of the Dialogue between Job and his friends (chs. 423).2 As Job makes
it increasingly plain that his friends assertions of orthodox doctrine are
inadequate to his case, the event of a third party is adumbrated, that of God, to
whom Job makes a dramatic appeal in his apology for his blameless life (ch.
29), the statement of his sufferings and the consequent crippling of his
potential in society (ch. 30) and the ultimate appeal in his oath of purgation
(ch. 31). Finally there is the dramatic entry of God in the Theophany and
Divine Declaration, which, far from giving a dogmatic answer, sustains the
interest of the reader by giving simply glimpses into ultimate truth and by
consequent assurance and rebuke, leaving Job in a state of tension as to his
adequacy to question God in view of the limitations of his experience and
reason and his grasp of the boundless possibility of the grace of God in the
scope of his own dimension. However, the drama of the Book of Job is never
merely formal. In the statements of Job throughout, the personal note prevails.
It is a strange reader indeed who, whatever his or her interest, philosophical,
aesthetic or even critical, fails to be engaged in the intensely existential
thinking of the author, which transcends the limits of logical debate and the
canons of formal drama. This clamant personal experience of the author of Job
must be borne in mind in our consideration of the question of the formal
character of the book, which we shall nd to be conditioned, though limited,
by the literary tradition of Israel.
Views which regard Job as a tragedy on the Classical Greek model,3 or a
dialogue like Platos Dialogues (Fries 1904), or even an epic like Homers, fail
entirely to recognize the literary forms of Israel and the ancient Near East,
which offer much closer analogies, and date mainly from the time when the
higher levels of culture in antiquity were arrogated for Greece through lack of
knowledge of, or even interest in, the culture of the further East.
Appreciative of the native milieu of the book, H. Richter suggests that its
structure reects the process of ancient law in Israel.4 This he reconstructs as
the preliminary efforts of the parties and assessors to settle the matter out of
court by getting one party to admit his liability, helping him to make this
admission without loss of face rather than forcing him. This failing, the next
step is to arraign him before the court with the help of witnesses, the process
being completed when the accused has admitted the evidence against him and
2. On our delimitation of the Dialogue to two rounds of debate involving Job and his
three friends, and a third section involving Job and Eliphaz in chs. 2223, with Jobs nal
dismissal of his friends with an oath of purgation and his declaration of the consequences of
perjury (ch. 27), and an assembly of miscellaneous fragments and poems (chs. 24, 25, 26),
see pp. 56-75.
3. This was the view of Theodore of Mopsuestia. Afnities with Aeschylus, particularly
Prometheus, have been emphasized by M. Jastrow (1920: 185ff.), J.J. Slotki (192728),
J. Lindblom (1939: 280ff.) and H.G. May (1952: 240ff.); with Sophocles by R. Lowth
1847: 372ff. (but dependence rejected).
4. Richter 1959: 11-58. This view is developed from the theses of L. Koehler (193031).
1
The Book of Job
41
accepted the sentence of the judge. This admission may be expressed, as

eventually Job admits that he had no reply to Gods challenge to his presumption to dispute the divine economy on equal terms (40.4-5; 41.2-6), or it might
be signied by his silence (40.4-5). But if the defendant was not convinced of
his guilt and in turn could not convince his accusers of his innocence, and in
default of actual evidence, he might still appeal to God, reinforcing his appeal
by an oath of purgation (as Job does in chs. 2931). Finally in the Book of Job
God replies to this appeal, convicting Job of seeking to subject him to the
limitations of temporal social conventions and dogmas against the evidence of
his free grace and power, humanity in its familiar environment being but one
object of his concern (38.240.14). To the nal verdict of God here implied
Job declares his submission (40.4-5; 42.2-6) and the case according to the
legal form postulated by Richter is closed.
This legal procedure is conjecturally reconstructed from Babylonian texts
from the second millennium BCE, from texts from Ptolemaic Egypt and from
passages in the OT admittedly sporadic and formally as widely divergent as
the patriarchal narratives and the Plaint of the Sufferer among the Psalms,
where Richter follows Hans Schmidt in his view that such psalms as Pss. 4; 5;
7; 26; 27.1-6, 7-14; 31.1-9 (EVV 1-8); 52; 109; 142 and possibly Pss. 11; 13;
54; 55.1-19 (EVV 1-18); 56; 59; 94.16-23 and 140 are relevant to the nal
appeal to God when a case proved inconclusive in secular justice.5 His schema
of the structure of the Book of Job certainly recognizes the dramatic character
of the work, for which the forensic case would be an admirable medium, and it
does full justice to the use of legal forms and diction. Richters emphasis on
the forensic pattern, however, seems to us to do less than justice to the full
signicance of other literary forms in the book, the recognition of which, in all
their rich variety and peculiar adaptation in Job, is the great merit of Fohrer
(1963b: 68-86) and to a lesser extent of Westermann (1956).
The recurrence of the forensic convention, so readily adaptable to sapiential
disputation, in the speeches of Jobs three friends, in the introductions to Jobs
statements, his argument in chs. 12 and 21 and in his nal appeal to God (chs.
293l), and in the introduction to the Divine Declaration (38.1-2) is not to be
denied. Against this formal aspect of the Book, however, is to be set the
substance of the denitive Book, Jobs despairing wish for death and oblivion
(ch. 3), the expostulations and arguments of his friends and his rejoinders (chs.
423), Jobs increasing orientation to God and his nal impassioned appeal
(chs. 2931) and the Divine Declaration (38.240.14). In Jobs statements here
5. Schmidt 1928. In the psalms adduced by Schmidt the subject protests his innocence
in contrast to penitential psalms, where the sufferer acknowledges that his suffering is
caused by his sin. The relevance of the latter to the fast-liturgy is likely, though the former
also may have relevance to the same situation, expressing the humiliation of the innocent
sufferer and his dependence on divine deliverance. Here the motif of the accusers, which
Schmidt took literally, may be a gurative expression of the popular conception that
suffering is the consequence of sin.
1
42
Westermann rightly recognizes features characteristic of the Plaint of the

Sufferer, and feasibly suggests that the arguments of the three friends are less
designed to provoke disputation than to give Job an opportunity to relieve his
feelings, which he does mainly in the literary convention of the Plaint of the
Sufferer (Westermann 1956: 5ff.). But throughout Jobs plaint, as in his initial
curse of the day of his birth (ch. 3), there is an undeniable note of controversy
in his setting the grim facts of his experience against Gods purposeful creation and moral economy, which nally succeeds in revealing the inadequacy
of orthodox doctrine and traditional morality in the existential situation of the
sufferer, who is thus eventually brought into confrontation with God for his
answer. Nor is the Theophany and Divine Declaration foreign to the Plaint of
the Sufferer, formally corresponding to the divine response or oracle, which
is either expressed or implied in certain of the plaints of the sufferer in the
Psalms, and is an even more regular feature of Mesopotamian texts on the
subject of the worthy sufferer, the afnities of which with the Book of Job we
have noted (see above, pp. 5-20). But being a rebuke leading to conviction
rather than merely an assurance, its afnity with the legal convention must not
be excluded. The role of Jobs three friends might be regarded as the amplication of the theme of the sufferers alienation from his friends which is more
vaguely mentioned in the plaints of the sufferer in Pss. 41.10 and 51.13. Or it
may correspond to the role of the friends of the sufferer in the Mesopotamian
texts who, either by contradiction or agreement, help the sufferer to express
his plaint. This may indicate that the denitive Book of Job is the dramatization of the Plaint of the Sufferer, as Westermann and Bentzen (Westermann
1956: 11; Bentzen 1959: 177) term it. This certainly does more justice to the
peculiar nature of the work, with its intensity, which is unique in Hebrew
Wisdom literature. This is the view of the book that we prefer, though we
should beware of applying it too mechanically in view of the rich variety of
literary forms each with its own characteristic implications to those in ancient
Israel familiar with such forms in their traditional Sitz im Leben. Nor can
anyone familiar with such forms in Hebrew literature be unaware that forensic
language and forms are frequently used in the Plaint of the Sufferer, just as the
harrowing details from the Plaint of the Sufferer are used in presenting a case
at law, the protestation of innocence being common in both conventions. Thus
we admit Richters emphasis on the forensic features in Job, though nding
that Westermanns view of the Book as the dramatization of the Plaint of the
Sufferer does fuller justice to its nature, which seems to us to be conrmed by
the Mesopotamian wisdom texts with which Job has afnity. Steinmann,
speaking more generally, describes Job as a voluminous legal dossier in an
abortive case, where the accused is interrogated before he is judged guilty,6
but when he verges on blasphemy, is acquitted and rehabilitated. The work, he
6. Steinmann 1955: 289: Par un trange paradoxe ce volumineux dossier juridique est
celui dun procs avorti.
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The Book of Job
43
suggests, did not conform to any preconceived pattern, but developed as a

reection of the writers own dialectic (Steinmann 1955: 270ff.), embellished
by a rich variety of literary forms, particularly the Hymn of Praise and the
Plaint of the Sufferer (pp. 56ff.). This view is largely the consequence of
Steinmanns conception of the present Book of Job as composed in four
stages: the rst consisting of Prologue, Dialogue and Jobs monologue, ending
at ch. 31, the second an expansion of this by the speeches of Elihu (chs. 32
37) as the answer to the problem of the Dialogue, the third a parallel edition of
the second, but with the answer in the Divine Declaration and the Epilogue
instead of in the Elihu section, and the fourth, the present book, the fusion of
those editions (pp. 273ff.).7 However, we prefer to think of the denitive
Book, without the addendum of the Elihu speeches, the poem on Wisdom (ch.
28) and perhaps a secondary expansion with inserted poems in chs. 2427 (see
below, pp. 56-75), as conceived according to a literary prototype, either as
legal process or, as we prefer, the Plaint of the Sufferer or the Mesopotamian
wisdom texts on the subject of the worthy suffererhowever this may need to
be qualied. Thanks, however, to the poetic genius of the author and particularly to his intense involvement in his problem, we have a work which
transcends the limitations of any traditional literary type and which in
consequence has been justly described as sui generis.
The framework of the book in the Prologue (chs. 12) and Epilogue
(42.7ff.) is the vivid narrative form of the saga or popular folk-tale with edifying purpose. The use of such narrative to introduce a more sophisticated
wisdom text has analogies in the Protest of the Eloquent Peasant (ANET 3,
407-10) in Egyptian Wisdom literature and in the introduction to the Aramaic
Proverbs of Ahiqar (ANET 3, 427). The narrative, however, as used by the
author of Job was adapted from an earlier work and has retained many features
of oral saga or folk-legend. Of those we may note round numbers in the
account of Jobs wealth, seven thousand sheep, a thousand camels, ve
hundred yoke of oxen and ve hundred she-asses (1.3), which were doubled
on Jobs rehabilitation (42.12); the quick succession of the bringing of bad
news, with verbal reiteration while the previous messenger was yet speaking;
and the total loss of Jobs oxen and asses (1.14), sheep and shepherds (1.16),
camels and herdsmen (1.17) and family (1.19), with the messengers as sole
survivor in each case. The crescendo effect of this account and the further
account of Jobs bodily afiction hold the hearer in suspense and key one up
for the sufferers reaction, uncertain whether that is to be the fortitude of faith,
as in the source (1.21; 2.10), or the despair of the realist, which Jobs wife
counselled (2.9). The hearer is also held in suspense for the solution of the
sufferers problem. These features are familiar in Hebrew tradition in the
patriarchal narratives in the older sources of the Pentateuch, with which the
narrative framework of Job has been compared. The E source particularly,
7. This is the view of the composition of Job proposed by van Hoonacker.
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44
with its moralizing tone, is reminiscent of the Prologue and Epilogue of Job.
This suggests the art of the professional story-teller, of the Arab rwi, a conspicuous gure in the coffee-halls of the East before the advent of gramophone, radio and television. Thus Muhammad introduced the Surah of Yussuf
in the Quran: We will recount to you the best of stories. The story itself,
however, had an edifying value like the story of Joseph in Genesis, emphasizing the guidance of providence in the vicissitudes of a worthy man (von Rad
1953: 120ff.). The saga features we have noted in the narrative framework of
Job, however, are also features of the Ugaritic Legends of Krt and Aqht in the
fourteenth century, and the association of Job with Danel [sic] in Ezek. 14.14,
20, may well point to a Canaanite popularization of a Mesopotamian wisdom
text such as we have noticed at Ugarit in the fourteenth century BCE (see
above, pp. 5-20) as N.M. Sarna has suggested (Sarna 1957; Spiegel 1945),
with a Hebrew version reecting the early patriarchal narratives in the ninth
century. Whatever the respective roles of Job and his friends may have been,
the present book gives no certain clue, and it must sufce for us to recognize
the saga and edifying tale as the survival of the source-material in the narrative
framework of the Book of Job in the Prologue and Epilogue (chs.12; 42.111), with Midrashic addenda much later than the completion of the book. The
narrative source so developed in the Israelite monarchy was adapted in the
Persian period in the scenes with the sn and his trials of Job in the
Prologue, probably by the author of the Book (Fohrer 1963b: 26ff.), but
preserving the character of the source.
The moral problem in the Dialogue of the Book was no novelty in Israel. As
has already been noted, it is implicit in the Plaint of the Sufferer, where it is
particularly poignant, as for example in Ps. 73.3-12, and while such psalms
cannot be dated precisely, the adaptation of this literary type by Jeremiah in
the sixth century indicates that it was already familiar in Israel. Assyrian
analogies indicate that this literary category was an element in the ritual of fast
and penance, where the king represented the community (Frankfort 1948:
260ff.; Mowinckel 1962: I, 46, 61, 225ff.), so that the sufferer in the Hebrew
psalms of this type was quite possibly the king as a societary gure.8
The Plaint of the Sufferer, whether communal or individual, follows a welldened pattern. The sufferings are stated usually both literally and guratively, and this cumulative list is followed by a cry for help. Here, as in
Mesopotamian laments, it is to be noted that the plaint is not a querulous
questioning of Gods order, but emphasizes the worshippers dependence on
God.9 A marked feature of the Book of Job, which it is the merit of Fohrer
(1963b: 70ff) to have recognized and duly emphasized, is the originalityand
8. The phrase coined by H.W. Robinson.
9. The cumulative list of sufferings was possibly developed from the counterincantation, the principle feature of which, as is evident from counter-incantations from
Mesopotamia, the systematic countering of malicious incantations be the verbal repetition
of the various evils which had been wished upon the sufferer; see e.g. Jastrow 1898: 272.
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45
indeed daringwith which this and other traditional forms are applied to
circumstances quite other than those with which they were originally and
traditionally associated. Thus the writer of Job adapts the Plaint of the Sufferer
as an indictment of Gods moral government. In the traditional Plaint of the
Sufferer, Gods former mercies may be recalled, either as the grounds of hope
in extremity or, as in the Communal Plaint in Psalm 44, as a foil to present
distress. This is the signicance of Job 29. But in association with Jobs plaint
in ch. 30 the emphasis on the social potential of Jobs prosperity makes the
plaint less of a lament than an arraignment of his divine opponent. Another
feature of the Plaint of the Sufferer is a confession of guilt, which is rather
general (e.g. Pss. 38.5, 18; 51.5; 79.8; 130.3), or perhaps a protestation of
innocence, which may in fact be elaborated as a separate psalm, as in Psalm
131. This latter element is naturally elaborated in Job. There is also a statement of faith in the providence of God, in which the nest example, again
elaborated as an independent psalm, is Psalm 23. This has its counterpart in
Jobs trusting submission to God in 40.3-5 and 42.2-6, though in form this
reproduces rather the legal convention of the acceptance of the verdict, as
Richter contends.10 The relief anticipated in the Plaint of the Sufferer may be
heralded by a reassuring oracle, as in the Communal Plaints (Pss. 60.8-11
[EVV 6-9]; 85.9ff. [EVV 8ff.]), mediated by a cultic prophet on behalf of God.
This last element is represented in the Book of Job by the answer of the Lord
in person,11 though characteristically it is adapted by the author as a challenge
rather than an assurance of the relief sought by the sufferer. As the experience
of Gods presence, however, seen now with the eye rather than merely heard
(42.5), with innite possibilities of new insight, new life, new hope, this is
even fuller than the oracle in the Plaint of the Sufferer. While the whole of the
Book of Job may be regarded as an expansion of the theme of the Plaint of the
Sufferer12 (all the characteristic features of which it employs or adapts), there
are certain passages in it which conform in detail to this type, such as those
just noted and particularly 16.7-17; 19.7-20 and 30.9-31. The Plaint of the
Sufferer, however, in the Book of Job has not the same signicance as in the
Psalms or in the Mesopotamian fast-liturgies and such wisdom texts as ludlul
bl nmeqi and the others cited above. There its purpose is to signify the
abasement of the subject and his dependence on the mercy of God, which he
either anticipates or has experienced. In Job, as H. Gese (1958: 76) has well
observed, Jobs plaint is not designed to evoke the mercy of God except in
10. Richter 1959: 125f. Fohrer also admits this (1963b: 23), though as an alternative to
the view that Jobs statement here corresponds to the assurance of the sufferer that he will
be heard in the conclusion to the plaint.
11. The failure to notice all the formal characteristics of the Plaint of the Sufferer in the
Book of Job led Dhome (1929: xlviii) to treat the Divine Declaration as a later insertion,
like the Elihu speeches.
12. A. Gese (1958: 63ff.) suggested that the book of Job is an adaptation of the
Klagehrersparadigma.
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death or vindication. Thus it has a controversial note, which is foreign to the

Plaint of the Sufferer in its cultic Sitz im Leben. We may add that, as well as
highlighting the contrast with Jobs righteous conduct, the list of his accumulated sufferings is adduced as an excuse for his questioning of the moral
order of God. This particular application of the Plaint of the Sufferer, with its
characteristic elements in Mesopotamian and Hebrew literature (the Psalms),
agrees with the adaptation by the author of Job of other literary forms proper
to a particular Sitz im Leben, where he uses the traditional association of ideas
not always to reinforce those ideas, but also to contradict them in the light of
experience. Dhorme, in his otherwise excellent commentary, has failed to
notice this tendency in his cavalier dismissal of the inuence of Mesopotamian
wisdom texts, to which he sees only a supercial resemblance in the Book of
Job (Dhorme 1929: lxxxvi). The appreciation of the signicance of the Plaint
of the Sufferer and of other literary forms in the Book of Job and the writers
highly original adaptation of them to his argument is the great contribution of
G. Fohrer (1963a) to the study of Job and the nerve of his magisterial
commentary on the Book.
We may consider the particular signicance of such passages in the context
of the Book of Job. In 16.7-17 and 19.8-13 Job describes the intensity of his
suffering in a series of highly colourful and concrete gures characteristic of
the Plaint of the Sufferer. In the Plaint of the Sufferer, the afictions at the
hands of the sufferers enemies are a prominent feature. In Job, however, God
is the persecutor. He has worn the sufferer out and shrivelled him up so that
his emaciation attests his sufferings and the enmity of God (cf. 19.20; 30.30;
Pss. 22.15 [EVV 14]; 18 [EVV 17]; 102.4 [EVV 3]); opponents take up the hue
and cry against him and gape at him (cf. Pss. 22.8 [EVV 7]; 35.21); he is
buffeted on the cheek (cf. Lam. 3.30); he has sown sackcloth on his skin (cf.
Pss. 35.13; 69.12, EVV 11); and in spite of all this, Job declares he is innocent
(cf. Ps. 73.13). In the context of Job 16 this citation from the Plaint of the
Sufferer emphasizes the intense suffering of Job, which justies the urgency of
his questioning of Gods moral Order to which his friends object with unseasonable philosophic detachment (16.1-6), and the protest of innocence with
which it closes leads naturally to Jobs claim that even if his sufferings, as they
are likely to do, prove fatal, his case be still left open for vindication (16.1822). In 19.7-20, in continuation of his complaint that God has prejudged his
case (vv. 7ff.), Job emphasizes his sufferings at the divine hand in a list of
sufferings typical of the Plaint of the Sufferer (vv. 7ff.). All his friends are
estranged from him and even his family (vv. 13-19; cf. 30.10a; Ps. 38.12 [EVV
11]), and he is reduced to skin and bone (v. 20, cf. 30.30; Ps. 22.15, 18 [EVV
14, 17]). In the sequel Job questions the right of his friends to pursue him like
God, and, claiming perhaps the same indulgence as the mentally ill, who are
regarded as touched by God (cf. v. 21), he claims pity rather than censure.
Jobs lament in 30.9-3l describes his sufferings in an accumulation of gures
familiar in the Plaint of the Sufferer. He is a byword to all, even the lowest of
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The Book of Job
47
society (v. 9; cf. Pss. 44.15 [EVV 14]; 69.12 [EVV 11]); good people are
appalled; he is surrounded by enemies; they spit upon his face (vv. 10ff.); God
has loosed his tent-cord (v. 11; cf. Jer. 10.20); he is prey to terrors (v. 15);
night racks his bones (v. 17); God has cast him in the mire (v. 19; cf. Ps. 69.3
[EVV 2]); he goes about black (v. 28; cf. Pss. 38.7 [EVV 6]; 42.10 [EVV 9]), the
companion of jackals and ostriches (v. 29); his lyre and his pipe are turned
to mourning (v. 31). So Job described his persistent misery as a contrast to
his prosperity in ch. 29. The subject is introduced by the popular attitude to
suffering, which reects the conventional view of suffering as the natural
consequence of sin and the withdrawal of the divine blessing. This is the
attitude of persons who share the leaders loss of the blessing (30.1-8) as they
had previously enjoyed his share of the blessing (ch. 29).
Here it must be emphasized that the recognition of the incorporation of
typical passages from the literary category of the Plaint of the Sufferer does
not necessarily militate against the authenticity of these passages in Job, but it
does suggest that the various references to suffering need not be literal and
biographical.
There are other passages of this nature, which Baumgrtel (1933) regards as
secondary to the Dialogue (e.g. 3.3-12, 13-19, 20-26; 7.1-10, 12-21; 8.12-19;
9.4-10, 25-31; 10.1-22; 12; 13.23-27; 14.1-22). It is difcult to see why 3.327, Jobs curse of the day of his birth (vv. 3-12) and the advantages of nonexistence (vv. 13-19) and the questioning of the purpose of life in misery (vv.
20-26), should be removed and the statement retained in v. 1 that Job cursed
the day of his birth. The following speech of Eliphaz (chs. 45) has as much
relevance to the one as to the other, and if 3.3-26 had not stood in the Book of
Job critics would certainly have demanded an opening speech from the
protagonist. From a dramatic point of view Jobs explosive curse of his life is
natural after this pent-up emotion (1.20-22; 2.9-13). Jobs speech is also the
introduction to the sages argument deploring the life of the wretched vv. 3ff.,
and questioning the purpose of life in misery in two passages (vv. 13-19, 2026), each introduced by Why? (lmmh) like the Egyptian Dispute over
Suicide (ANET 3, 405-407) and the Babylonian Theodicy (Lambert 1960: 6391). Actually 3.1 is to be taken with the prose narrative in ch. 2 and, as 3.2
indicates, 3.3-26 is the introduction to the Dialogue.
The fact that the Book of Job is the production of a poet of original genius
and one well versed in the native literature of Israel and probably also in the
wisdom literature of the Near East, who was also a philosopher engaged not in
presenting a preconceived conclusion but in experimental and creative
thought, must seriously modify any view of such passages as secondary. The
imprecation with elaboration of the calamity invoked is a well-known literary
category, best known in the OT in Balaams oracles on Edom (Num. 24.18),
Amalek (Num. 24.21-22) and developed in the folk-oracles in Amos (1.32.3).
As applied to the subjects own life it is paralleled in Jer. 20.14-18, but it is
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questionable if this can be regarded as a distinct literary category, in spite of

the close verbal correspondence between Job 3.3-12 and Jer. 20.14-18.
In vv. 1-10, which Baumgrtel also regards as secondary, vv. 1-2 deals generally with the brevity of human life, proceeding then to the particular misery
of Job (vv. 3-6) and then, with apparently an apostrophe to God, to the brevity
of his life and the imminence of death. This adds point to Jobs appeal for the
sympathy of his friends rather than their censure, which is the theme of 6.1430, and to his claim on God for mercy and relief rather than apparently pointless persecution as if he were not a man responsive to God, the sea or seamonster (tannn), known in the Ras Shamra texts as the inveterate enemies of
Gods Order. The sequel, Bildads reply that God does not pervert justice, but
that suffering implies sin (8.2-4), might seem to connect directly with 6.29-30,
but his insistence on the availability of Gods mercy on repentance (8.5-7, 2122) and humanitys vital need of it (vv. 11ff.) is the direct reply to Jobs
complaint of the pointless brevity of human life and the indiscriminate hostility of God. The author adopts the Plaint of the Sufferer with its enumeration of
sufferings in 7.1-10 as the traditional appeal to God, specically in the sequel
(vv. 11-21), since his case has proved beyond the understanding and sympathy
of his friends.
The passage 9.25-31, in the tradition of the Plaint of the Sufferer on the
theme of the brevity of life and the agonizing problem of Gods apparent
indifference to human righteousness, does seem to be a self-contained passage
which breaks the sequence of thought between v. 24 (which states that God is
indifferent to justice) and v. 31 (which states that he is inaccessible to the
innocent sufferer who claims justice). After the statement that God destroys
innocent and wicked alike, sudden death mocking the innocent (9.22-23), vv.
25-31 seems tautological. The explanation is possibly that the latter passage, a
Plaint of the Sufferer, was suggested secondarily by vv. 22-23.
10.1-22, in contrasting the sufferers relationship to God with his relationship in arbitration or in inquisition with humanity (vv. 4-6, cf. 9.23), reverts to
the theme of 3.11-13 (10.18-19), and echoes the theme of the pointless brevity
of human life (v. 20, cf. 9.25-26), which may suggest that 9.25-31 is secondary. Verses 8-17 introduce fresh argument that Gods creation and providential care for humans as moral beings (v. 12) are inconsistent with human
sufferings in spite of their merit. In 10.2-20, as in many passages which have
been regarded as secondary, Job addresses not the friends but God, and so, it is
claimed, they do not relate directly to the Dialogue. There is nevertheless
usually some connection with the thought of the context and allowance must
be made for the intensity of the authors thought, which all the while was
creative, questing for a solution of his major problem beyond the strict connes of the orthodox arguments advanced by Jobs friends.
Other passages in Job have been regarded as secondary because they are
self-contained expressions of general truth, including 3.20-23, 7.1-2 and 14.112, 18-22. These may well be citations from wisdom literature which in the
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sequel are applied to Jobs own case. Thus the general truth of 7.1-12 is
particularized in Jobs case in vv. 3-10. 14.1-2 expresses, perhaps in citation, a
general truth, which the author uses to question Gods censorious judgment of
mortals (v. 3); v. 4 implies humans limitation, and v. 5 Gods determination
of the human life-span; v. 5 states the authors claim that in the brief life
which God has given humans he should, it is implied, if his creation of them
has any point, allow them to live in peace since, the passage continues (vv. 712), death brings annihilation and oblivion. The author continues his argument
that if he could hope for life beyond the grave with a correspondence with
God, he would be content to endure all the hardships of life (vv. 13-17). This
hope sinks with the nal declaration of the mortality and nal annihilation of
humans (chs. 1822). Here, though the argument points the statement of a
general truth with the authors own experience in the role of Job, it is
impossible to determine whether ch. 14 is a later expansion from wisdom
literature supported by the general statement of human evanescence in 13.28,
or a number of citations to which the author adds his own annotations, or
whether the whole (both general truths and particular elaborations) are the
work of the author as poet and philosopher. The references throughout the
book and the variety of literary forms indicates the authors wide repertoire,
and there is no indication that his work was conned to the strict dialogue and
his adaptation of his source. At any point he may well have inserted a passage
of his own work, either composed ad hoc or an independent piece, which he
considered appropriate in the context.
Another distinctive literary category in the Book of Job is the Hymn of
Praise, in, for example, 5.9-16, 9.4-10, 12.7-10, 13-25, which Baumgrtel
regards as secondary, and 26.5-14. The Hymn of Praise is well known in
Mesopotamian liturgy, a characteristic being the attering invocation of the
god by all his conceivable titles or epithets and references to his exploits,
which ensured that, whatever his mood, the worshipper could not fail to use
the proper means of address. In the Hebrew version of the Hymn of Praise, in
place of this plethora of divine titles God was addressed as the Creator, or, in
the adaptation of the liturgy of the Canaanite New Year festival, as the one
who, like the Canaanite Baal in the Ras Shamra texts, had prevailed over the
powers of Chaos, exemplied in the unruly waters of the sea or river oods or
in the water-monsters such as Rahab, Tannin or Leviathan, or in the sustaining
of nature or the social order, or as the God who had overthrown the Egyptians
and delivered Israel from the land of bondage. This in the liturgy of the New
Year festival was a means of engendering fresh faith in Gods providential
Order as well as being an expression of homage to God. In Israel the reference
to such exploits took the place of divine titles in the Mesopotamian counterpart, but a formal correspondence remained in the Hebrew Hymn of Praise in
the reference to the divine exploits by a series of participles of the verb (cf.
Ps. 104; Amos 4.13; 5.8-9). These characteristic features distinguish the Hymn
of Praise in the Book of Job.
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The Hymn of Praise in the context of Wisdom literature is nothing extraordinary. Its theme, as in the Psalms, being generally the providence of God
in creation and history, it might be cited in Wisdom literature either for
criticism or in support of argument for the divine economy. Thus for instance
a Hymn of Praise is cited in the wisdom Psalm 8 on the theme of humanity so
insignicant in the universe yet the consummation of Gods works (cf. Ps.
144.3, a Royal Psalm). The Hymns of Praise in Job are very apposite in their
context whether in support or in criticism of the divine economy.
Thus in 5.9-16 Eliphaz checks Jobs wild lament and nihilistic philosophy
in ch. 3, where incidentally Job uses the form of the Hymn of Praise to extol
death and oblivion (3.17-19). So Eliphaz maintains the doctrine of Gods
Order in nature and society and commends Job to commit his case to God by
the traditional confession of faith whereby the worshippers approached God in
condence and hope. The Hymn of Praise in 9.4-10 is plainly relevant to its
context. Bildad has just advanced the orthodox view of the providence of God
expressed in the doctrine of sin and retribution, holding out the hope of the
divine mercy on human repentance. Jobs reply is to admit the might and
unfathomable wisdom of God in nature. But by the same token God is
inscrutable and inaccessible in the personal need of humans, as the immediate
context states (vv. 3, 11-12). In reply (in 12.7-10, 13-25) to Zophars
presentation of the orthodox view of Gods providence and the possibility of
grace (ch. 11) Job admits the doctrine of Divine Providence in the same
literary convention but emphasizes the destructive rather than the constructive
aspect of providence (vv. 13-25). This section, which is actually a parody of a
Hymn of Praise, is particularly characteristic of the authors originality in
adapting familiar literary forms to new signicance according to their context
in his argument.
In Scripture the citation of a verse or even a phrase is often evocative of a
much larger passage and its characteristic context. Thus Jobs question Am I
Sea or Tannin? (7.12) is to be understood as evoking a well-known theme of
the Hymn of Praise, Gods triumph over the primeval powers of Chaos. Thus
the author animadverts on the providence of God who would thus treat a
righteous person, a moral being who aspired to realize the image of God
within oneself, and on the abuse of his almighty power in breaking a mere
mortal who might more ttingly have been the object of his mercy.
Certain forms of prophetic communication are also adapted in the Book of
Job. The communication of Eliphaz, for instance, in 4.12-16 employs the form
of the prophetic declaration of a theophany and the ensuing oracle adapted as a
sapiential statement (4.17-21). The apparent indictment of Job for palpable
sins (22.6-9), and the punishment for them introduced by the formula
Therefore (lkn) is the traditional prophetic form of indictment, probably
adapted from the controversy (r) originally sustained by an advocate for God
in the sacrament of the Covenant (Gemser 1955: 128ff.) (cf. Judg. 6.7-10 and,
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with a detailed list of offences, Amos 2.6-12; Hos. 4.1-2; Ps. 50.17-21). This
passage, however, is not, as in the true prophetic tradition, directed at a
particular person or community, least of all Job, of whom Eliphaz alleges no
particular sins here, upbraiding him not for sin but for impatience and despair
(4.3-6). Eliphaz does eventually charge Job with particular sins, mainly of
omission (ch. 22), but this is the forensic tradition, and is to be understood as
giving Job a concrete charge to answer and in preparation of his oath of
purgation (ch. 31).
Throughout the book, where the theodicy is called in question and Job
asserts his claim to be allowed to state his case at the bar and be answered in
open court by God, the gures, phraseology and literary forms of law abound,
duly emphasized by Richter, perhaps overemphasized at the expense of the
wide range of other literary forms equally prominent in Job. Nevertheless the
legal forms and gures are impressive, as we should expect in a book of this
kind, which opens with the activity of the public prosecutor in the heavenly
court and ends with Gods counter-challenge to Job:
Gird up your loins like a warrior
That I may question you and you shall declare to me (38.3)
The most striking and signicant of the legal forms is Jobs great oath of
purgation. This convention was well attested in antiquity. In cases between
two parties where no witness was available, an oath was taken at the sanctuary
by which the parties invoked grave penalties upon themselves. This was
known in Mesopotamian law (The Code of Hammurabi 103, 106, 107, regarding claims of merchants and travelling agents; 249, where a hired ox is
alleged to have died a natural death; and 266, when a shepherd claims to have
lost beasts entrusted to his care by the attack of beasts of prey). The last case
was settled also in Israel by oath of purgation at the sanctuary (Exod. 22.9),
like alleged adultery (Num. 5.16-28) and other unspecied cases (1 Kgs
8.31ff.; 2 Chron. 6.22ff.). A particularly close formal correspondence with Job
31 may be observed in Psalm 7. See further H.H. Schmidt (1928). Nearer the
time of Job the oath of purgation at the sanctuary was known in the JudaeoAramaean colony at Elephantine by Aswan.13 The negative confession of
various sins in similar context was projected into the judgment in the hereafter
in the Egyptian Book of the Dead (ANET 3, 34-36), in connection with the
ceremony of weighing the heart of the defunct against the feather of maat
(Order, Truth), which Dhorme cites (1928: 412) propos of Job 31.6:
Then may (God) weigh me with just balance,
And let him know my innocence.
Actually Jobs oath of purgation itself shows a variety of literary forms,

which Fohrer (1963a: 84 n. 24) has classied as:
13. Volz 1912. The passage is in Pap. 27 of Sachaus edition.
1
52
1.
the solemn assertion of innocence, invoking a covenant to which the

subject is a party (31.1-4),
2.
an adjuration stating the conditions under which the specied curses
would be operative (vv. 5-35, 38-40b, 16-17, 18, 19-20, 21-22).
3.
an adjuration stating the conditions under which the curse would be
operative, but not specifying the curse (vv. 24-34).
In view of our arrangement of the text here, however (see below, Introduction
to ch. 31), we should include vv. 24-35 in the second category, thus eliminating Fohrers third class.
The enumerations of twelve different sins is signicant here, having an
exact analogy in the twelve sins upon which a curse was endorsed by the
sacral community at the Covenant Sacrament in the tradition of Shechem
(Deut. 27.15-26). The sins of course are not the same as in the days when the
community was thus safeguarded against absorption into the life and religion
of Canaan; they relate to the individual, dening his duties as the Decalogue
(Exod. 20.2-17; Deut. 5.6-21) had dened them, as a member of the covenantcommunity of Israel. The passage is valuable as indication of the relevance
and development of such codes as the Decalogue among Jews in about the
middle of the fth century BCE.
Formally ch. 31 is a self-contained unit, but its adaptation in the Book of
Job indicates clearly that it is integral to the structure of the book. It ttingly
marks the culmination of Jobs repeated appeal from the opinion of conventional morality to God himself. In the law of Israel and the ancient Near East
the sanctuary was the nal court of appeal in the oath of purgation. This
invoked the immediate activity of God. In the context of the authors literary
model, the Plaint of the Sufferer, God intervenes to help the sufferer who had
implored his mercy. In the authors adaptation of his prototype God intervenes
in response to Jobs daring challenge in his oath of purgation. As the culmination of Jobs dearest desire for confrontation with God and as anticipating
the theophany and divine address (38.140.2, 6-14), Jobs great oath of
purgation in ch. 31 is indispensable in the structure of the book. By the same
token the speeches of Elihu (chs. 3237), whatever the value of their content
and their representation of continued thought in the circle of the author of Job,
are an intrusion which barbarously disregards the dramatic climax of the book.
Throughout the book, by his highly original adaptation of traditional literary
types to reinforce ideas traditionally associated with them, but more often with
the opposite signicance in the style often of parody, the author has kept the
reader on the alert. So he does to the end. Here, where we expect the Divine
Declaration as an assurance in the convention of the Plaint of the Sufferer, or
an acquittal or condemnation in the legal response to Jobs oath of purgation,
we have instead a counter-challenge, introduced by the language and literary
form of a legal summons (38.1-3; 40.2, 7-8).14 But here again the writer shows
14. The language is probably the reminiscence of belt-wrestling as a legal ordeal, which
is attested in a legal document from Nuzu cited by Gordon 195051.
1
The Book of Job
53
his familiarity with the wide range of literary forms. Gods argument and
counter-challenge is not sustained in legal forms, but in forms familiar in the
sapiential tradition, where students were trained both to discriminate and
recognize afnity by means of classied lists of natural phenomena, each item
elaborated as a little Hymn of Praise to the Creator and all combining to praise
his providence which reaches to realms beyond human power or comprehension, but into which they have a glimpse which may encourage them to
hope beyond the full evidence of experience. The passages, on the various
natural phenomena moreover in their interrogative form, have afnity with a
form of controversy in Egyptian wisdom literature.
In a sapiential work like Job characteristic literary forms of wisdom literature are naturally used. The whole argument is in the form of the philosophic
dialogue with thesis and antithesis as in the Egyptian Dialogue of a Man with
his Own Soul (Thomas [ed.] 1958: 162-67) and the Babylonian Theodicy.15
The Book of Job is the only example of Hebrew Wisdom in the form of a
dramatic dialogue, but it has a variation in the experimental method of
Ecclesiastes, where the sage states hypotheses and then proceeds critically to
test them.
This is the method adopted in Job 21.17ff., where a number of proverbs
typical of the conventional moral philosophy are citedfor example, How
often is the lamp of the wicked put out? (cf. Prov. 13.9; 20.20) and God
stores up iniquity for their sonsand are then exploded by the citation of
actual experience.
The didactic poem is used to emphasize the principle of sin and retribution
in Zophars speech in 20.4-29. This may have been incorporated en bloc from
a different context, but Jobs riposte (21.7ff.), with a parody on the impunity
of the wicked and the indiscriminate fate of wicked and innocent in death,
clearly indicates that the passage was integral to the book. This passage recalls
the question of the prosperity of the wicked which is cited as a scandal to the
faithful sufferer in the psalms of the type the Plaint of the Sufferer (Pss. 10.5ff;
73.3-9; 17.17; 49.7; 52.9b), as Fohrer observes (1963a: 74).
The didactic declaration on the fate of the wicked and the blessing of the
upright is familiar in couplets and in antithetic parallelism in Proverbs, e.g.
14.11:
The house of the wicked will be destroyed,
But the tent of the upright will ourish.
This theme may be amplied in an elaborate gure like the antithetic gures in
Ps. 1.3ff., where the Homeric simile in v. 3 recalls that in Job 6.15-21. So the
blessing of the righteous who has sought Gods pardon and the fate of the
obdurate wicked are set in antithesis in 11.14-20. Thus in Job there are didactic
declarations at length and with a wealth of concrete detail and imagery on the
wicked and their fate (in Job 4.8-11; 5.2-7; 8.8-19; 11.20; 15.17-35; 18.5-21
15. See above, p. 7.
1
54
and 20.4-29), which Job parodies, describing the prosperity of the wicked
(21.7-16), and on the blessing of the righteous (in 5.17-27; 8.5-7; 11.13-19
and, after this model, ch. 29). Such passages are generally used respectively as
sober admonition or as encouragement by Jobs friends in support of the
theodicy, but, as has been indicated, the author may characteristically give
them an original turn in the mouth of Job. Here as in his use of other literary
types he is not bound by the circumstances with which the literary form
was traditionally associated, but it is only by the recognition of the traditional
Sitz im Leben that the particular point of his usage of the literary type is
appreciated.
The hymn on the fundamentality of Wisdom (Where shall Wisdom be
found?) in Job 28 is already known as a distinct literary type from the Hymn
to Wisdom as Gods instrument of creation in Prov. 8.22-31. In another
context in the book, for instance, in the context of Gods speeches, the passage
might have been considered original, but in its actual context it must be
regarded as secondary, a commentary on the limitations of traditional wisdom.
The classication of rebels against the light in Job 24.13-17 has its literary
prototype in the classied categories in Prov. 30.18-19 (things which leave
no trace of their course), 30.24-28 (creatures small but effective), 30.29-31
(beings stately in their gait) and 30.21-23:
Under three things the earth trembles,
Under four it cannot bear up:
A slave when he becomes king,
And a fool when he is lled with food,
An unloved woman when she gets a husband,
And a maid when she supplants her mistress.
Such classied lists of natural phenomena and social categories have already
been noted as a feature of Mesopotamian and Egyptian wisdom literature (see
above, pp. 5-8). The citation of classied instances of Gods creation in the
Divine Declaration (38.240.2, 6-14) shows the same inuence of this
sapiential type, being reminiscent particularly of the Onomesticon of Amenemope (probably thirteenth century BCE) (Gardiner 1947) on all the works of
Ptah (the creator-god) in the sky and what pertains thereto, on the earth and
what is in it, the afnities of which, with the Divine Declaration, have been
particularly stressed by von Rad.16
The same ultimate inuence of Egyptian wisdom tradition may be noticed
in the interrogative form of the passages on the works of the Creator which
constitute a challenge to Job in the Divine Declaration. Von Rad (1955: 298301) cites the analogy of the Egyptian Papyrus Anastasi I (thirteenth century
16. Von Rad 1955; Richter 1958a. Richter would include the passages on the hippopotamus and the crocodile in this category, their fuller categorizations being of the same
nature as the lists of natural phenomena according to their characteristics, their fulness
being justied by their position as the culmination of the classied lists in ch. 39.
1
The Book of Job
55
BCE)
(ANET 3, 477-78), where the scribe Hori humiliates a rival scribe by

addressing a series of ironical questions, and challenges him on knowledge
of details of scribal expertise and knowledge. A feature of this text is the
challenge couched in the imperative as well as in the interrogative, as in Job
40.10-14:
Pray deck yourself with pride and exaltation,
And put on glory and splendour!
Pour out your overowing anger
And lay low every haughty man you see.
If you see any proud man abase him,
Pull down the wicked from their place;
Hide them in the dust together,
Imprison their persons on the lowly ground;
And I will render you praise
That your right hand has wrought deliverance for you.
The use of the challenge in the imperative, along with the ironical question
in the Egyptian sapiential prototype in Papyrus Anastasi I and the extension in
the Onomasticon of Amenemope from the world of nature to society, might be
cited as a strong argument for the view that in Job there is but a single Divine
Declaration and not, as in the extant text, two speeches.
Apart from the formal afnity of the Divine Declaration in Job with the
Egyptian prototypes there is common to both Hebrew and Egyptian texts the
interest in the Divine Order in nature and society (Egyptian maat and Hebrew
eqh or mip; see above, pp. 5-7), which the sufferings of the innocent
have brought into question. Gods government (mip), a consequence of his
sovereignty, was traditionally the theme of the Hymn of Praise in the liturgy of
the New Year festival in Israel with its Canaanite prototype reected in the
Baal Myth of Ras Shamra. Thus the statement of Gods activity in creation is
impregnated with Canaanite mythology, especially in 38.4-11 which refers to
Gods triumph over Chaos, represented by the sea (38.8-11). Compare the Ras
Shamra text Gordon UT 68, which was a prelude to the establishment of Baal
as King and the imposition of his government in nature. The total effect of the
divine address, then, is that of the traditional Hymn of Praise.
Thus the author of the Book of Job moved easily through the wide range of
Hebrew life and literature.17 Preoccupied with his main moral problem, he
was too skilful a teacher and a poet to present a colourless philosophic discussion, but introduced a rich variety of language, gures and literary forms,
which enlivened his argument and extended the scope of his message beyond
the schools of the sages to the whole of the life of his people.
17. The use and adaptation of those literary forms with their specic signicance in the
tradition of Israel is a strong indication that the Book of Job was intended for a Jewish
audience and not, as Tur-Sinai suggests (1957: xxvii; 2nd edn 1967: xxxvii), to convince
the Gentiles in Mesopotamia.
1
Chapter 6
THE COMPOSITION OF THE BOOK OF JOB
The Narrative Framework

Having discussed the possibility of a popular version of the ordeal of an
innocent sufferer and his tenacious endurance in faith, which possibly developed from such a text as we have noticed in Mesopotamia, which is actually
attested at Ras Shamra in the fourteenth century BCE (see above, p. 18), we
have argued for a didactic version in rhythmic narrative prose in Israel in the
early monarchy (see above, p. 18). The tradition survives in the Prologue and
Epilogue, with the editors adaptation to theological conceptions in Judaism in
the fth century BCE. This serves the author as a basis for his more mature
sapiential work in the intervening Dialogue and its sequel in Jobs apologia
pro vita sua (ch. 29), his plaint (ch. 30) and his oath of purgation (ch. 31), the
Divine Declaration (38.140.14), and Jobs submission (40.3-5; 42.2-6). In the
Epilogue it serves also as a counterpoise to the very sharp criticism of the
orthodox teaching of the sages of Israel in Proverbs and Wisdom Psalms
expressed in the addresses of Jobs friends in the Dialogue, as the nal
statement, or addendum, in Ecclesiastes (12.13f.) counterbalances the work of
the gentle cynic.
Jobs Curse on the Day of his Birth
Before the Dialogue proper (chs. 427),1 ch. 3 takes up the suggestion of Jobs
wife in the Prologue to curse God and die! (2.9). Job does not succumb to
this temptation, but in cursing the day of his birth and the futility of a life
exposed to unremitting suffering, he seriously questions Gods Order, a
recurrent theme of the Dialogue. This chapter then serves as a bridge between
the Prologue and the Dialogue.
The Dialogue
The Dialogue in the MT is limited to chs. 427, though we will question what
has been generally regarded as a debate in three rounds of addresses and
1. Fohrer (1989: 34) treats this chapter as part of the Dialogue.
1
The Book of Job
57
responses from each of the four speakers in which Zophars expected third
address is wanting or wrongly attributed to Job (see below, pp. 59ff.).
There is no question about the rst two cycles of the Dialogue, which we
may tabulate:
First Cycle (chs. 414)
45
67
8
910
11
1213
14
Eliphazs remonstrance to Jobs curse (4.25.7) and encouragement

(5.8-27)
Jobs response
Bildads expostulation (8.2-19) and encouragement (8.20-27)
Jobs response
Zophars expostulation (11.2-12) and encouragement (11.13-20)
Jobs response (12.213.19) and direct appeal to God (13.20-27)
Jobs direct address to God continued, ending the rst cycle of the
Dialogue
Second Cycle (chs. 1521)

15
1617
18
19
20
21
Eliphazs expostulation
Jobs response, emphasizing his sufferings in the language and
imagery of the Plaint of the Sufferer (16.6-17; 17.1-2, 6-8, 11-16),
with a plea for direct confrontation with God (16.18-20), direct
appeal to God (17.3.4) and nal statement of his integrity (17.9)
Bildads expostulation
Jobs response
Zophars expostulation
Jobs response
Conclusion of the Dialogue (chs. 2227)

22
23; 24.1-12
25; 26.5-14
27
Eliphazs expostulation and arraignment of Job (22.5-8) in anticipation of Jobs apologia (ch. 29) and oath of purgation (ch. 31), with
encouragement to come to terms with God and be restored to favour
(22.21-30)
Jobs response, amplied by a wisdom poem on the conduct of the
wicked (24.13-17), with possible interpolation of a Wisdom poem on
their eventual retribution (24.18-25)
Hymn of Praise to God transcendent (ch. 25 attributed, perhaps
secondarily, to Bildad), secondarily introduced by 26.2-4,
secondarily attributed to Job
Jobs nal dismissal of his friends case, with an oath of purgation
(27.2-6) and elaboration of the consequences to him of perjury
(27.7ff.)
With this the Dialogue ends

2931
Jobs Oath of Purgation and Prelude

Jobs apologia, with its social potential (ch. 29)
Jobs Plaint, implying the impairing of that potential (ch. 30)
Jobs Oath of Purgation (ch. 31); this is at once a response to
Eliphazs particular accusations in 22.5-8 and a prelude to the Divine
Declaration
58
38.139.30;
40.25-30
(EVV 1-6);
40.7-14
40.3-5; 42.1-6
42.7-11
6. The Composition of the Book of Job

The Divine Declaration
Jobs Submission
Epilogue
Interpolations
24.13-17
24.18-25
25.2-6; 26.5-14
28
3237
40.15-24
(EVV 41.7-11)
41.4-26
(EVV 41.12-34)
42.12ff.
Wisdom poem on nocturnal criminals

Wisdom poem on the eventual retribution of the wicked
Hymn of Praise to God Transcendent
Sapiential poem on Wisdom
Elihu addendum, addressed to the arguments of Job and his friends,
culminating in Hymn of Praise to the Divine Creator (36.2637.12)
Poem on Behemoth, the Hippopotamus
Poem on Leviathan, the Crocodile, secondarily prefaced by 40.25-30
(EVV 41.1-6)
Midrashic Expansion
The Dialogue
The Dialogue proper opens with Eliphazs response with mild yet rm censure
of Jobs impassioned reaction to his suffering. He urges the current doctrine of
the sages that suffering implied sin, which he advises Job accept, and by due
contrition to return to the divine favour. From this point the Dialogue proceeds
with addresses to the same effect by the three friends, with diminution of the
element of encouragement which marks the end of the addresses by Eliphaz
(5.8-27), Bildad (8.20-22) and Zophar (11.13-20) in the rst cycle of the
Dialogue and the intensication of their insistence on the theme of the invariable connection of sin and suffering, which Job refuses to admit in his case,
becoming more and more vehement in his protestation throughout the rst
cycle of the Dialogue. The intensity of Jobs response to his friends is marked
by direct address to God (7.7-21; 10.2-22; 13.20-29), and in the nal colourful
soliloquy on the mortality of humanity in ch. 14 (vv. 2-6, 15-17), which ends
the rst cycle of the Dialogue. Here also emerges Jobs appeal to God to state
the charges against him (10.2) that might explain and justify his afiction,
with an urgent appeal for confrontation with God and a fair chance to reply to
actual charges (13.20-23).
In the second round of the Dialogue (chs. 1521) the friends intensify their
censure of Job for opposing their arguments and the tradition which emphasized the mutual relevance of suffering and sin to his resentment directed to
God and his daring demand for a confrontation. Their theme is sustained by
what traditional Wisdom taught of the ultimate end of the wicked in striking
gures (15.17-35, Eliphaz; 18.5-21, Bildad; 20.5-29, Zophar) with the added
1
The Book of Job
59
notice that even in the heyday of the wicked, retribution is anticipated by the
hazards of their conduct: the wicked are racked by anxiety all their days
(15.20; 18.11-12). To Eliphaz, Job replies in the style and gure of the Plaint
of the Sufferer (16.8-17; 17) and similarly to Bildad (19.11-20), emphasizing
the alienation of his friends (16.817.5), with particular reference to Eliphaz
and his colleagues (16.7; 19.2-6), which leaves him but the prospect of
vindication before a divine tribunal (16.18-22; 19.25-27). To Zophars declaration on the downfall of the prosperous wicked (ch. 20), and generally to the
friends arguments in support of the theodicy, Job concludes the second cycle
of the Dialogue by elaborating the ourishing of the wicked without retribution, culminating in an honoured burial and incidentally exploding what
Bildad has claimed as the universal validity of well-worn proverbs (18.5ff.).
We consider it questionable that the author conceived a third cycle of the
Dialogue corresponding to the rst two. Volz (1911: 66ff.) long ago expressed
this doubt. It is not to be denied that sentiments attributed to Job in the MT are
more characteristic of the views already expressed by the friends and this has
suggested disruption of the text.2 Buhl considered that chs. 2528 is a collection of short passages of varying origin adapted to the authors work secondarily with the intention of depicting Job as eventually conforming to the
orthodox view of the theodicy which he has so sharply criticized (Buhl 1925).
This view has been revived with modication by Snaith, who proposes that the
section consists of distinct fragments not indeed of various origin but possibly
written by the author himself, though never quite integrated with the Dialogue.3
Westermann has developed the thesis of Volz. Starting from the assumption
that a third round of the Dialogue contains only one speech of Eliphazs and
none of Bildad and Zophar, closing with Jobs statement in ch. 23, Westermann proposes that chs. 2427 consist of fragments comprising parts of earlier
speeches and later additions which have not been fully integrated into the book
(Westermann 1956: 102-104). Thus he would associate 24.1-17, on the
instances of oppression unchecked by God, with Jobs earlier statements on
this subject, and would associate 24.18-21, on the condign end of the wicked,
with one of the friends earlier statements. Again 24.5-8, 10-11, describing the
wretchedness of the oppressed, and 24.13-17, a series of vignettes classifying
malefactors hostile to the light in the tradition of the listing of manifestations
of a common principle in sapiential literature (e.g. Prov. 10.15f., 18f., 21-23,
2. Sentiments attributed to Job in the MT more characteristic of the views already

expressed by his friends have suggested the disruption of the text (so Tournay 1957;
Pfeiffer 1953: 171; inter alios).
3. According to Snaith (1968: 61-63), the most probable solution to the literary
problem of cc. 24-26 is that in these chapters we have the further speculations of the author
himself concerning the whole problem of God in his heaven and man on the earth, and that
either he began to t these ideas into his scheme, but died before he proceeded very far, or
found them too difcult, if not impossible, to t into his scheme, and gave up.
1
60
24-28, 29-31), may be excerpts from some sapiential source listed for
incorporation into the Book of Job but never quite integrated with it.4 Westermann gets over the difculty of the exceptionally short statement attributed to
Bildad in ch. 25 in the form of a Hymn of Praise to the majesty and righteousness of God by assuming that, with 26.5-14 in the same tenor, it belongs to
Bildads statement in ch. 8, an arrangement which Volz had already proposed
(1911: 34). This is feasible insofar as it might explain Jobs riposte to the
citation of a Hymn of Praise to God as sustainer of creation in 9.5-10 and the
passage on Gods sublime indifference to Jobs outraged innocence in 9.11-24.
Westermann further proposes that 26.1-4 and its heading was the introduction
to Jobs statement in ch. 9 which lacks the customary sapiential introduction.
In ch. 27 he takes vv. 2-6, in which adjuration predominates, as probably the
introduction to Jobs oath of purgation in ch. 31, and proposes that 27.8-10,
13-25, which is counter to Jobs declarations hitherto, as the end of Zophars
statement in ch. 11, while 27.11-12, which is in the characteristic style of the
introduction to statements of the disputants, is, Westermann suggests, the
introduction to Elihus speech in ch. 32 or to the poem on Wisdom in ch. 28.
Fohrer also would nd disruption of any dialogue in chs. 2427 by displacement of text, adjustment and insertion (1989: 34-36), particularly of independent poems from the Wisdom tradition. In what he regards as the third cycle of
the Dialogue (chs. 2127), though incomplete, he admits Jobs statement in ch.
21 and Eliphazs statement in ch. 22 as original and in place. From the exceptionally short statement attributed to Job in ch. 23, Fohrer assumes that a
longer statement was intended, indicated by the statement in 27.11 I will
teach you concerning the power of God, a promise which is apparently not
realized. He suggests that Jobs statement in ch. 23 and perhaps in 27.11 was
possibly interrupted by the secondary insertion of Wisdom poems, four in ch.
24 (10.12, 22-23; 5-8; 13-17; and 18ff., with glosses and secondary expansion); a Hymn of Praise to the Creator, attributed in the MT to Bildad, probably
secondarily, in ch. 25 and continued in 26.5-14, 26.2-4 and 27.2-6 as Jobs last
statement in the Dialogue; and 27.7-10, 13-23 on the end of the wicked as a
sapiential poem.
While subject-matter in the various parts of chs. 2227 might with considerable adjustment afford material for the reconstruction of a third cycle of
dialogue involving all four disputants according to sentiments already associated with each, form-criticism, we would contend, indicates that this is
unlikely. The xed points that must guide us are Eliphazs statement in ch. 22,
the main point of which is his indictment of Job, alleging his failure to full
the responsibilities of his prosperity and high standing. This directly anticipates, and is specically related to, Jobs great oath of purgation (ch. 31),
4. Volz 1911: 45; Fohrer (1989: 367, 370) resolves this chapter into four separate
Wisdom poems, of which only the rst, vv. l-4, 10-12, 22-23, on his arrangement,
represents Jobs view as in his statements in ch. 23.
1
The Book of Job
61
preceded by his prosperity and its benets to society (ch. 29), all of which
have been lost in his ruin (ch. 30).This passage, taken in conjunction with ch.
29 is tantamount to an indictment of Jobs divine antagonist at law. The next
stage is the divine response (38.239.30; 40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-6), and Jobs
submission (40.4-5; 42.2-6).
Between Eliphazs indictment (ch. 22) and chs. 2931 is Jobs insistence on
the justice of his case if only he could gain a hearing from God (23; 27.2-6) in
the personal tone of dialectic and forensic idiom, which is proper to that
context, where Jobs case rapidly approaches its climax in the divine confrontation. The intervening passages (24.1-25; 25.2-6 and 26.5-14) are markedly
impersonal and of a different literary form. Chapter 24 as a whole is a sapiential poem, or, according to Fohrer, four sapiential poems on the cruelty of
oppressors, and their eventual retribution; 25.2-6 is a Hymn or part of a Hymn
of Praise to God transcendent, beyond the questioning of humanity, a mere
worm (25.6); it is continued in 26.5-14 in the theme of Gods sovereignty in
creation, which the poet describes as but the outskirts of his ways, of which
humans apprehended only a whisper. 27.7-10, 13-23 is a sapiential poem on
the miserable end of the sinner, which, however, we consider that the author
adapted as imprecation to Jobs oath in 27.2-6 in his nal dismissal of his
friends. And nally, to support the view that between ch. 22 and chs. 2931
there has been substantial interpolation of secondary matter, is the poem on
Wisdom (ch. 28), which is generally taken as independent, and the Elihu
addendum (chs. 3237).
Assuming the secondary nature of those poetic passages in the Dialogue, we
may ask what prompted their inclusion between 22; 23; 26.1-4; 27.1-6, 11-12.
In ch. 24 the detailed list of abuses of power amplify Eliphazs allegation of
Jobs sins of omission and failure to full his responsibilities. In the same
context the passage on nocturnal criminals, surely the citation of a sapiential
categorization, may be prompted by Eliphazs imputation to Job of the
question, What does God know? (22.14).
The hymnic statement ascribed to Bildad (25.2-6), setting the question of
human justication before God in the context of his transcendent might,
obviously relates to Jobs persistent assertion of innocence and condence of
acquittal if only he had a fair hearing. This is the adaptation to Jobs case of a
Hymn of Praise continued in 26.5-14, as is indicated by the assertion of Gods
sovereignty on high (25.2) and in the underworld (26.5f.), and is an instance
of citation in extenso5 which recurs in such passages cited to reinforce dialectic
arguments throughout the Dialogue. The ascription of ch. 25 to Bildad in the
MT may reect the secondary effort to construct a full-scale third cycle of the
Dialogue comparable to the rst two. 26.2-4, which we consider redactionally
5. Tur-Sinai (1957: liiif.) duly notes this citation in extenso, which he explains as
intended to certify the citation of a certain sentiment or sentence as coming from an
authoritative source and not simply an expression of the authors personal opinion.
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62
ascribed to Job, probably belongs to a tentative third address by Bildad

reecting the introduction to Eliphazs rst address (4.3ff.).
With the admission of a possible third statement of Bildad, though tentative,
however, we would not see in 27.7-10, 13-23 a third statement of Zophar,
whose sentiments it admittedly expresses though it does seem to be a Wisdom
poem, as Fohrer maintains, but, we consider, not independent and incorporated
by a redactor endeavouring to construct a third cycle of the Dialogue, where
Job wishes upon his antagonists in the Dialogue the fate of the wicked, the
theme of the poem quoted. We regard it as belonging to Jobs adjuration in
27.2-6.
We propose a form-critical approach to the problem of ch. 27 in favour of
the whole in the order of MT as the statement of Job as the heading states. The
statement asserting his innocence is in the form of an oath (vv. 2-6); what
follows is a Wisdom poem adapted by the author as an imprecation. In his
strenuous protestation of his innocence Job includes in his imprecation his
enemy, that is any who is alienated from him on the assumption that the
sufferer is guilty and alienated from God, including by implication his friends.
In this and what follows we should nd a formal afnity with the curse on
those opposed to the sufferer in the Plaint of the Sufferer (e.g. Pss. 35.26;
55.16, 24 [EVV 15, 23]; 58.7-10 [EVV 6-9]; 59.11-14 [EVV 10-13]; 69.23-29
[EVV 22-28]; 139.19-22).
In pursuance of the theme of the fate of the wicked, which he wishes upon
his antagonists (27.7-10), the author introduces a sapiential poem on the
retribution of the wicked (vv. 13-23). This is introduced by an address to the
friends, whom Job undertakes to teach the purpose of the Almighty (vv. 11f.).
What follows seems at rst sight nothing new to the friends. But in the mouth
of Job, who had dissociated himself from their conclusion from his suffering
to his guilt and their elaboration ad nauseam of the fate of the wicked under
the divine economy, it was calculated to surprise, and indeed shock, them. We
consider it in effect an elaboration of Jobs imprecation not only on his antagonists but on himself if guilty of perjury in his oath in vv. 2-6. With this oath of
purgation Job terminates his case with his friends. In thus dismissing them he
uses their own theme of the fate of the wicked, which they themselves have
seen (v. 12a), but in a much less impersonal and even supercial way (Why
then this empty vapouring?), holding himself liable to the same fate if he is
perjuring himself.
Jobs Great Oath of Purgation and Prelude
Jobs apologia (ch. 29) is an effective reply to his arraignment by Eliphaz and
is complementary to his oath of purgation (ch. 31). The solemn oath with its
imprecations is his preparation for his nal confrontation with God for which
he has been continuously pressing in the Dialogue. He has been directing his
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63
case progressively from his friends to God and now, having dismissed them in
his sworn statement in ch. 27, he makes his nal appeal to the divine tribunal.
This demands response from God either in condemnation or acquittal. The
prelude, moreover, in the glowing picture of the social benets of the divine
favour which Job had enjoyed and shared (ch. 29) and of the great social
potential crippled by the suffering he endured (ch. 30) is in itself a case against
God who had permitted this situation to develop. On this account the divine
response is surely imperative.
The Divine Declaration
The Divine Declaration, which we take as a unity (38.1-39; 40.25-30 [EVV
41.1-6; 40.2, 6-14]), with displacement of 40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-6) on Leviathan
(the crocodile) and Jobs submission in 40.4-5 from before 42.2-6, with the
poems on Behemoth, the hippopotamus, (40.15-24, 31-32; 41.1-3) and
Leviathan (41.4-26 [EVV 12-34]) as a later addition, has been rejected by some
as part of the original Book of Job.6 Sufce it to say that the narrative source
of the Book in 42.7 implies a Divine Declaration. In the context of the authors
version this was demanded by Jobs challenge in his oath of purgation and its
prelude. On the analogy of the theophany and oracle in the Plaint of the
Sufferer, in the form of which Jobs hard case is so often presented, such a
Divine Declaration is expected, as also in the Mesopotamian texts on the same
subject which we have noticed (see above, p. 9). The answer is not a formal
acquittal in the legal tradition, as the source in the epilogue implies, nor
formally assurance as in the Plaint of the Sufferer. In the developed work of
the author of Job it relates to the Order in nature and society for which Jobs
friends have contended against Jobs sharp criticism and indeed parody (ch.
12) with relation to his own case. Thus it takes the form of a magnicent
statement of Divine Omnipotence and Wisdom in creation beyond human
control or comprehension (ch. 38) and of Divine Providence for the wild
creatures apart from human control or convenience (ch. 39). However, this
statement in itself, though properly emphasizing that humans are not the
measure of the universe so that they may call Gods economy in question, is
not so obviously related to the human predicament in the Dialogue, and so
called for the challenge to Job to match God in the effective control of the
social Order (40.2, 6-14).
Thus, in the authors development of his source, we would admit the Divine
Declaration, as we have delimited it, in its universal scope. Less would not
have been expected of God in reply to Jobs contention in the Dialogue; nor
would we expect less of the poet in such a monumental work. Moreover, while
we cannot ignore the rebuke to human presumption to criticize Gods
economy despite their limited knowledge and experience, we cannot agree
6. E.g. Studer 1875; Staples 1925: 11f.; Rankin 1936: 93; Irwin 1937: 45ff.
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64
with Cornills opinion that the Divine Declaration was savagely ironical.7 The
irony, which is not to be mistaken, was more kindly, the expression of a
concealed severity and calm superiority and the effective and benevolent
incisiveness of a higher insight, according to Ewald (1882: 294). It is at the
same time an encouragement to mortals in citing the many instances of Gods
daily providence besides the spectacular evidence of his rule and Order
expressed in the Hymn of Praise familiar in the history of Israel in the liturgy
of the New Year festival (Westermann 1956: 91ff.).
The question remains as to the extent of the Divine Declaration, apart from
what we consider addenda, the poems on Behemoth (40.15-24, 31-32; 41.1-3)
and Leviathan (41.4-26 [EVV 12-34]). The double introduction And Yahweh
answered Job out of the whirlwind (38.1 and 40.6), in both cases with the
challenge Brace yourself like a man and I will question you and you shall
declare to me (38.3; 40.7), would seem to indicate two declarations8 or
perhaps two versions which have been unskilfully fused. The double submission of Job in the MT (40.3-5 and 42.1-6) might indicate the same. The substance of 40.2, 6-14, however, stressing the limitations of Job in the moral
Order, which more distinctly connects with the attitude of Job assumed in the
Dialogue, might justify a repetition of the formal challenge to Job in 40.7,
unless with Fohrer it is taken, like 40.1, after 38.1, as a redactional gloss. The
assertion of Gods omnipotence in the moral Order, however, is the natural
complement to the declaration of his power and providence in the natural
Order, as well as being directly relevant to the debate in the Dialogue. We
would therefore retain it as an integral part of a single Divine Declaration,9
whether we regard 40.7 as a fresh challenge to Job, to whose case 40.2, 6-14 is
particularly relevant, or Fohrer is right in regarding it as a redactional gloss.
Jobs Submission
In the interest of a single Divine Declaration we would agree with Fohrer in
assuming a single submission of Job, assuming the displacement of 40.4-5
from immediately before 42.2-6.
7. Quoted by Strahan 1914: 14.
8. So Le Fvre 1949: 1081; Skehan 1964; Gordis 1965: 122f.
9. So Bickell, Budde, Duhm, Steuernagel, Sellin, Lods, Hlscher, Siegfried, Fullerton,
Lindblom, Lvque, Fohrer. Westermann regards the Divine Declaration as substantially
one though formally divided. Others propose the omission of 38.139.30 (e.g. Kraeling
1938: 144). Eissfeldt (1965: 459) also nds 40.6-14, with Jobs reply in 42.1-6, more
closely linked with the main theme of the Dialogue than anything else in the Divine
Declaration; cf. K. Fullerton (1924), who rejected 40.3-4, presumably since Gods control
of his order in nature in 38.140.2, to which Fullerton would conne the Divine Declaration
along with 40.3-4, involves also his control of the moral Order. S.R. Driver and G.B. Gray
(1921: 160) omit 40.6-14, a modication of Grays earlier view that both parts of the Divine
Declaration were secondary (G.B. Gray 1913).
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Major Addenda
The Poem on Wisdom
Between the complex chs. 2227 and Jobs oath of purgation and its prelude in
chs. 2931 stands the Poem on Wisdom (ch. 28). This has formal afnity with
the sapiential tradition of instruction by question and answer (e.g. Prov. 23.29;
Eccl. 8.1ff.; etc.), the question being a refrain,10 As for Wisdom, whence
comes she? The answer is deliberately withheld by statements of inaccessibility by the most strenuous effort of humans and the inestimable value of
Wisdom, which emphasizes the nal answer that God alone understands the
way to Wisdom, his instrument in creation (cf. Prov. 8.23-31).
In the present book it follows ch. 27, which is headed as a statement of Job,
and being itself without a heading it has been taken as a continuation of Jobs
statement (so Budde). But in the detached academic tradition, as distinct from
the dramatic Dialogue with its heavy borrowing from forensic idiom, the
Plaint of the Sufferer and the Hymn of Praise, to say nothing of Jobs agonized
pleas to God, it is obviously sui generis and is suspect as a secondary insertion. This suspicion is conrmed by the fact that the statement that Wisdom is
the property of God alone (and is unattainable to any human) would unduly
anticipate the main point of the Divine Declaration.11
As a sober limitation to the condent claim of traditional Wisdom that
Wisdom could be acquired according to the repeated exhortations in Proverbs,
this passage would be admittedly a tting conclusion to the inadequate efforts
of Jobs friends to explain the sufferings of the worthy man by the traditional
doctrine of the theodicy, as well as an animadversion on Jobs negative and
humanistic arguments. This evidently persuaded Westermann and Tournay
that the passage belonged to the original conception of the book of Job
(Westermann 1956: 107; Tournay 1957: 31), but in view of the interruptions to
the dramatic movement of the work by the incorporation of wisdom poems
and hymns of praise between chs. 23 and 2931 we would regard ch. 28 as
also redactional. It may be an insertion by one of the authors circle, and we
are prepared to admit that it was by the author himself, perhaps available to a
later redactor.12
However tting the poem may have been as a conclusion to the Dialogue
and as a corrective to the assurance of Jobs sapiential friends and of himself,
10. Fohrer suggests that the same question or a variation of it may have introduced the
poems; so A. Weiser (1968: 198), J. Lindblom (1945: 79) and C. Kuhl (1953: l. 281) regard
the introduction as the fragment displaced to 27.11.
11. M. Jastrow (1920: 136), C.J. Ball (1922: 8), P. Szczygiel (1931: 233), J. Lindblom
(1945: 91) and N.H. Tur-Sinai (1957: 395) regard the poem as displaced from after the
Divine Declaration, not as a comment on the inadequacy of the wisdom of Jobs friends in
the Dialogue, but as a supplement to the Divine Declaration.
12. So Gordis 1965: 102. We hardly agree with Gordis, however, in his assessment of
the poem as probably a youthful effort.
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66
its inclusion in this particular context, where the text has suffered disturbance,
may have been through its association with other independent poems assembled for inclusion at some point or other in the Book of Job, and was perhaps
specically suggested by the couplet in 27.11:
I will teach you concerning the power of God,
The purpose of the Almighty I will not hide.
The Elihu Passages

Those passages (chs. 3237), which intervene awkwardly to break the dramatic sequence between Jobs invocation of the immediate activity of God in
his great oath of purgation (ch. 31) and the theophany and Divine Declaration
(38.1ff.), are certainly an intrusion, and are so treated by practically all modern
commentators, though a number have regarded them as integral to the book.13
There are certain very signicant features in the Elihu passages which
suggest an origin independent of the rest of the Book of Job. Elihu is not
mentioned among Jobs friends in the Prologue, the Epilogue or the Dialogue.
Nor does Job reply to him as he does to his three friends, and in the Divine
Declaration which immediately ensues at 38.1 it is to Job in his nal appeal in
ch. 31 that God replies. The section is disproportionately long, a lecture or
learned treatise rather than a round of argument or lively debate as in the
statements of Job and his friends in the Dialogue, with their striking gures of
speech.14 Elihu is not committed as Job and his friends, but theologically
detached. A number of new words appear in Elihus statements which occur
nowhere else in Job, and Wagners statistics show about half as many
Aramaisms again than in the rest of Job excluding the Prologue and Epilogue
(Wagner 1966: 139-43).
It is often objected that the Elihu passages add nothing to the argument.
That is true in so far as strict relevance to the main theme of Job is concerned,
but Elihu has his insights, notably the disciplinary purpose of suffering,
particularly in the case of the worthy man, as a preventative of spiritual pride
(33.12-30). Much indeed of this section is a recapitulation of the arguments of
Job and his friends, with specic citation of Jobs statements, but new points
are made and new emphasis laid. The signicant contribution of the Elihu
passages is the emphasis laid on the urgency of Gods grace beyond the
anxiety or expectancy of humans (33.14ff.; 35.10) and on the attitude of praise
to God for the signal tokens of his providence, which will leave humans no
time for recrimination but will help them to adjust themselves to realities. But
so far as Elihus arguments elicit no response from Job, and since his insistence
13. Cornill 1907: 426ff.; Wildeboer 1905: 380f., 382ff.; so also Van Hoonacker 1903;
Pedersen 1926: 531; Humbert 1955; Peters 1928: 23-29; Szczygiel 1931: 23ff.; Dennefeldt
1939; Eerdmans 1939: 16f.; Dubarle 1946: 84ff.; Guillaume 1964b: 27-35.
14. This was already emphasized by E. Renan (1889: 37); cf. S. Mowinckel (1955:
313): He has the whole discussion in his head and takes up particular propositions, partly
in verbal citation, partly in contradicting them in the tone of a schoolmaster.
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67
on Gods providential order in nature beyond the understanding of humanity is

simply a statement of Gods own declaration,15 it must be said that, whatever
fresh insights the Elihu passages present, they contribute nothing to the
dialectic progress of the debate as such, but in the nature of commentary they
must be regarded as intrusive. The fact remains, however, that Elihu seems
less concerned to help Job to adjust himself to his situation and own his guilt
and so nd pardon than with the raison dtre of suffering as an academic.
Recognizing this, Rowley argues that since the reason for Jobs suffering is
already known as a test of his piety, this concern of Elihu indicates the
secondary nature of the passage.
The unity of the Elihu passages has been questioned. Thus H.H. Nichols
(191011) proposed that chs. 3233, 34 and 3537 were from different hands,
a view which was developed by Jastrow, who distinguished four quite distinct
compositions in the Elihu section,16 and W.A. Irwin (1937: 36ff.) who
regarded chs. 3233 as the original ending to the Book of Job according to a
hand later than the author of the Dialogue and chs. 3437 as later comments
from sapiential tradition between c. 400 and 100 BCE. More recently Westermann maintained that the Elihu speeches are articially composed from an
unnished draft of supplementary arguments to the Dialogue (1956: 109). This
view was developed by D.N. Freedman, who concluded that the Elihu passages, already elaborated as several speeches in their present form, were composed by the author of the book of Job with the intention of re-organizing his
work, a project which he gave up because it would have disrupted unduly the
existing form of the Book. The theme of the conclusion of the Elihu passages,
however, expressed in the Hymn of Praise (36.22ff.), was developed in the
Divine Declaration, especially in ch. 38. The Elihu passages were then added
subsequently in their present place by a later hand (Freedman 1968). But
whether the material assembled according to Freedman was the work of the
author of the Book rather than an independent supplement is a matter which
seems to defy solution. In the view of the detached academic interest which
we have noted in contrast to the more intense involvement of the speakers in
the Dialogue we consider the latter explanation of the Elihu passages the more
likely. It can well be imagined that the Book of Job became a favourite text in
sapiential circles, and it is not unlikely that the Elihu section is a crystallization of theses from the Book of Job originally debated piecemeal in such
circles, like the theses in Ecclesiastes. If this is so, we may expect considerable
disagreement among critics as to the order in which the matter was composed
in the Elihu speeches or the order in which it has been transmitted in the MT.
15. Lvque concludes from Elihus verbal citations of Jobs statements that the author
of the Elihu section had a written text of the Dialogue before him and that the challenge in
interrogatory form on the subject of created nature in 37.15-20 is a conscious imitation of
the Divine Declaration, which was included in this written text.
16. Jastrow 1920: 77ff.; so also Buttenwieser and Kraeling.
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The Passages on Behemoth and Leviathan

Anyone who has experience of speaking or writing for effect knows the
importance of making a decisive conclusion. Thus after the passage on the
sovereignty of God and the limitations of Job in society, in direct reply to the
problem of Job, the reversion to the theme of creatures in nature beyond
human control in the long descriptive passages on Behemoth and Leviathan
must surely make a rst impression of a later expansion.17 Considering the
possible relevance of those passages, Westermann suggests that Behemoth and
Leviathan are treated as historical forces hostile to God, as Egypt was depicted
as tannn, the monster of the Nile, possibly envisaged as the crocodile, in
Ezek. 29.3.18 However, this is questionable. Leviathan in the eschatological
passage in Isa. 27.1 and Rahab in Isa. 51.9, which Westermann cites, are rather
the cosmic forces traditionally overcome by God in the establishment of his
effective rule, the theme of the liturgy in the New Year festival in Mesopotamia and Canaan, where ltn (Hebrew liwyn) is known in the Ras Shamra
texts with this signicance. The historication of this theme, as for instance
in Ezek. 29.3, is secondary to the cosmic theme and a particularization of it.
The description of Behemoth and Leviathan undoubtedly refer respectively
to the hippopotamus and the crocodile, but the designation of the latter as
Leviathan is extraordinary since the Hebrew and Ugaritic traditions describe
the monster as serpent (naas/bn). Hence H.H. Schmidt has contended for
mythological overtones in the passage on Leviathan19 which may claim the
support of the LXX, which renders Leviathan as ho drakn. The same may be
said for Behemoth, Egyptian p imw, the hippopotamus, which was the
symbol of chaos ritually slain by the Pharaoh in the cult of Horus at Edfu.20
Thus the passages on Behemoth and Leviathan have recently been defended as
authentic by a number of scholars on the grounds mainly that those two
monstrous instances of destructive power beyond human control, with their
undertones of the myth of the conict of cosmos and chaos, are a tting climax
to the Divine Declaration that even the suffering of the innocent, the helplessness of humanity and the apparent inadequacy of human justice are under the
17. Dhorme, having defended the originality of those passages in his commentary
(1928: lxiii-lxxv), rejected them as later accretions in La Bible (1959: cxxxii). Lvque
(1970: 502f.) rejects the passages mainly on stylistic grounds. Hertzberg, Kuhl and Kissane
consider them as addenda. Others have regarded them as compositions of the author but
inserted later by him (so Larcher 1957: 13) or by a later scribe (so Steuernagel 1953: 382).
18. Westermann (1956: 87) contends that Leviathan has this signicance in Isa. 27.1,
like Rahab in Isa. 51.9; cf. Isa. 30.9, where the historical application of the mythological
theme is more obvious.
19. Schmidt 1966: 183n. H. Gunkel also (1922: 41-49) regarded the signicance of
Behemoth and Leviathan in Job as wholly mythical; so more recently Pope 1965 and
Gibson 1985: 251ff.
20. Fohrer 1989: 523, citing T. Sve-Sderbergh 1953: 55f.
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divine control,21 or, as J.C.L. Gibson has contended (1985: 254ff.), that those
sinister forces beyond human control continue to challenge the Order of God,
who alone is able to hold them in control though they demand his constant
effort and vigilance. However, if this were so it would surely have been stated
more explicitly in those passages.
There are signicant stylistic differences between those passages in 40.1524, 31-32; 41.1-3 (EVV 40.15-24; 41.7-11) and 41.4-26 (EVV 12-34) and the
Divine Declaration in 38.139.30 and 40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-5) which militate
against the original association of the two passages. The detailed and lengthy
description of Behemoth and Leviathan is certainly far different from the
artistic economy with which the works of God in nature are treated in 38.13039.30; 40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-6), where signicant characteristics are noted
selectively in the broadest outline. H. Richter has taken this discrepancy to be
the design of the author, who permitted himself this latitude at the end of his
account of the works of God (Richter 1950: 253). There are, however, other
objections to the authenticity of those passages which are not so readily
explained. The passage on Behemoth is not introduced by the interrogative as
the rest of the natural phenomena except the passage on the ostrich (39.13-18),
and that passage, to be sure, is suspect either as a secondary insertion or a
fragment wanting an introduction, and is moreover noted in Origens Hexapla
as lacking in the original LXX, being supplied from Theodotions translation.22
God is moreover referred to in 40.19 in the third person, which suggests a
citation from a poem independent of the Divine Declaration, possibly drawn
from a sapiential poem classifying and describing natural phenomena including the beasts. Thus we consider the passages on Behemoth and Leviathan,
which we have delimited, addenda to the Divine Declaration which ended at
40.14.
The passage on Leviathan in 40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-6) is introduced and
sustained like the rest of the passages on the beasts (except that on the ostrich)
by questions, and like them emphasizes either the intractable nature of the
beasts and/or the inability of humans to have any advantage from them. This
indicates that it belongs to the original Divine Declaration, being displaced
after the passage on Behemoth to provide an introduction to the passage on the
crocodile (41.4-26 [EVV 12-34]).
21. Lods 1934: 514; Hertzberg 1950: 253; MacKenzie 1959 emphasizes the cosmic
signicance of Behemoth and Leviathan as representing the historical forces inimical to the
Order of God.
22. Dhorme (1928: 551) explained the omission of the passage in the LXX as owing to
the difculty of translation and, we might add, to an imperfect text which was occasioned
by difculties of vocabulary, with further complication by efforts to understand it. Lvque
(1970: 503) regards the passage on the ostrich and the horse (vv. 19-25) as original, though
he regards the order of the passages as reversed by the redactor in order to associate the two
because of the comparison in the passage on the ostrich with the speed of the horse (v. 18).
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The descriptive passages on Behemoth and Leviathan, as indicated by the

name Behemoth (Egyptian p imw, hippopotamus) and the word-play on
tim and Egyptian ems, and Coptic ems (crocodile) indicate the Egyptian provenance of the passage, which may be further indicated by the
signicance of the hippopotamus in the myth and ritual of Edfu and by the
reference to the crocodile as king, its signicance in Egyptian hieroglyphics.23
Adjustments to the Original Dialogue
Within the Dialogue proper (chs. 427) there is considerable difference of
opinion as to how much is original. As in any book of antiquity a number
of expressions, glosses, and short commentaries on the text, usually fairly
obvious and often quite prosaic in a poetic context, may be noticed, and the
Dialogue is really not affected by their admission as secondary. The case is not
quite so simple for a number of longer passages, which E. Bruston (1928: 297305) segregated as expressing generalities, thus, he claims, departing from the
strict dialectic of the debate and from the particular case of Job. Those include
hymns of praise (e.g. 5.9-16 from Eliphaz, 9.5-10 from Job on God in creation
to emphasize his aloofness, and 12.13-25 from Job emphasizing rather the
destructive aspect of Gods government in nature and in society) and didactic
passages (e.g. 5.12-26 from Eliphaz). He segregates also a numerical cluster of
statements of preservation in seven emergencies (cf. Prov. 30.15-31), with
afnities also with prophetic blessing after pardon (11.13-19 from Zophar on
the requital of the pious, 15.20-35 from Eliphaz, 18.5-21 from Bildad on the
end of the wicked, a theme which is also found in the Plaint of the Sufferer,
and 27.13-23, which is attributed to Job in chs. 2427 on the same theme). He
includes in addenda citation of popular aphorisms, for example 8.11-19 from
Bildad and the Plaint of the sufferer in 19.7-20 from Job, which interrupts his
complaint against Gods injustice and his friends misunderstanding (19.1-6)
and his appeal to his friends sympathy and his statement that his case shall yet
be heard (vv. 21-27).
Here, however, the plaint emphasizing Gods hostility (19.8-12) and Jobs
isolation in his trouble (vv. 13-20) obviously emphasizes Jobs statement
of his case, and is therefore the authors own citation. Even in the strictly
dialectic passages the language and imagery reveal the author as a poet, and,
as poet and sage, familiar with the whole range of his peoples literature. In
view of his interest in the suffering of the innocent and the problem of the
theodicy which it raised it is inconceivable that he should not have been
steeped in the Plaint of the Sufferer, which was projected against the background of the Hymn of Praise on the government of God, (e.g. Ps. 89.6-15, 3952 [EVV 5-14, 38-51]). Again it is quite natural that illustrations of Gods order
23. Fohrer 1989: 531, citing Erman 1894: 180.

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in the homely aphorisms of didactic literature should have been cited to assure
Job that human suffering was not fortuitous nor the effect of the caprice of an
arbitrary divine tyrant, leaving humans with no hope or opportunity to prot
from their experience. It was natural for Jobs friends to supplement their
arguments with such citations, and indeed the book of Job would have been a
singularly jjune production without such passages. Thus reduced it would
have an interest for the moral philosopher or theologian, but would have
lacked the general appeal and arresting power that is the hallmark of a great
piece of literature. Those who would divest the Dialogue in Job of such
passages in the interests of strict dialectic ignore the fundamental principle that
Lindblom so justly emphasized,24 that argument among Orientals does not
depend merely on logic, but on the vehemence, persistence, emphasis and
variation of expression with which it is presented, and the more pleasing the
rhetorical style, choice of diction and imagery the stronger is the appeal of the
argument. The passages on which Bruston animadverted might be ruled out of
order in Western debate, but would be expected in the East. Even if they do
interrupt the strict dialectic they are never unapt. They are in fact citations, and
are noted as such in their dialectic context at 8.8-10; 12.12; 15.18f., which
indicate that they are citations by the author of the denitive book and are not
secondary. Had they been of the limited proportion of citations familiar in
Western debate they would have been generally admitted; but Orientals,
though they may cite by limited quotation and even by allusion, is also fond of
citing at length as we have personally found frequently in discussion with
Arabs, where the relish of a quotation from the Quran would often carry them
far beyond the bounds of the strictly relevant.
Baumgrtel likewise took exception to the Hymn of Praise, the didactic
passages on the blessing of the righteous and the end of the wicked noted by
Bruston, and other such passages in the Dialogue (Baumgrtel 1933: 159f.).
He reduces (pp. 160ff.) the original Dialogue to one round of debate, 4.15.7,
27 (Eliphaz); 6.1-30 (Job); 8.1-11, 20-22 (Bildad); 9.1-3, 11-23, 32-35 (Job);
11.1-5, 10-20 (Zophar) and 13.1-9 (Job) with a monologue from Job (16.6-9,
12-17, 18-21; 23.2-7, 10-17; 29). This, Baumgrtels original dialogue, he
considered to be developed from an original monologue in the style of the
Plaint of the Sufferer like Psalm 73, which may be conjectured in 17.2-20;
21.7-18; 22.12-16; 24.2-4, 9, 12, itself to be developed in a further compilation
in three rounds of debate using the original dialogue for the rst round and
the original monologue for the second and third rounds. It was at this point,
according to Baumgrtel, that the scope of the work, which, like that of the
Plaint of the Sufferer, concerned the sufferers relationship to God, developed
24. Lindblom 1945: 40ff. Tur-Sinai (1957: liiif.) admits such citation in extenso, which
he explains as intended to certify the citation of a certain sentiment or as coming from an
authoritative source and not simply an expression of the authors personal opinion.
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72
more as a sapiential work on the more general question of the theodicy. He

rightly emphasized the predominance of the theme of the end of the wicked,
though delayed, in the second round of the debate in the present form of the
book. The original work, however, was considerably modied in Baumgrtels
estimation, especially in his third round of the debate, so that it can no longer
be recognized. He regarded this compilation as further modied by the
inclusion of chs. 2831. Over and above, the passages from hymns of praise,
plaints and didactic poems, which Baumgrtel would segregate as secondary,
have to be accommodated, but at what stage he is uncertain. In his view we
must further reckon with displacements, intentional or unintentional, losses of
text, amplications, omissions, and nally with revision by a redactor, who
brought in insertions for the sake of conformity with the rest of the Dialogue,
including the divine names l and elah in parallel with adday, which we
should rather consider only one of the various stylistic features that support a
less complicated view where the passages in question are citations made by
the author of the denitive Book himself.
Baumgrtel distinguished between the statements both of Job and of his
friends which were partly addressed to the personal and particular case of Job
and partly to the general question of the government of God, the theodicy. The
latter, he claims, interrupt the current of thought in the context, being
expressed in different literary categories, the Hymn of Praise and didactic
poetry or dicta. Such passages fall signicantly at the end of statements of the
friends, who have already made their point in the debate on the specic subject
of Jobs complaint and, it is claimed, add nothing to the argument. Besides
such passages, Baumgrtel under similar considerations segregated as secondary Jobs oath of purgation (ch. 31) excepting vv. 35 and 37, and 27.2-12,
where Job protests his innocence (vv. 2-10) and undertakes to instruct his
friends about Gods purpose (vv. 11f.), which he regards as part of the
Dialogue in the authors source which he modied in the denitive book.
Baumgrtels whole argument for the secondary nature of the passages he
notices is based on his excessively mechanical application of form criticism
and the assumption that the Dialogue was conned to the consideration of the
personal problem of Job. However, in a sapiential text, where the universal
interest is emphasized by the international character of the disputants and by
the generic names of God, it is most unlikely that Jobs case should not be
considered in the wider context of the theodicy, the current interpretation of
which the Book of Job challenged. The fact that the passages in question fall at
the end of the friends statements need not mean that they are secondary
insertions. This place is not only suitable for the insertion of secondary matter;
it is even more so for apt citation as an appeal to higher authority in a literary
work which gives evidence at every point that it is more than the report of an
actual disputation of a particular case. In reply to the claim of the worthy
sufferer that his case was not adequately met by the doctrine of the theodicy
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current in Judaism of the authors time there was no better expression of this
doctrine than the Hymn of Praise to the Creator and Sustainer of Order in
nature and society and the didactic poem, and no stronger expression of the
agony of Job alienated from God than the Plaint of the Sufferer. Such passages
round out and clinch the arguments of Jobs friends, as is recognized by
Kraeling, Westermann and Fohrer. Kraeling, to be sure, was hesitant about
ascribing them to the author of the extant book either as his own work or
citations from other sources or as anonymous compositions inserted by a
redactor (Kraeling 1938: 29-94), but Westermann and Fohrer have no
hesitation in admitting them as citations by the author, and Kuhl aptly cites the
analogous citation of the Hymn of Praise in the doxologies in Amos and in
Deutero-Isaiah as well as in the First Book of the Maccabees (Kuhl 1953: 287).
In the Hymns of Praise in Jobs statements in 9.4-10 and 12.13-25, the
regular theme of the Hymn of Praise, the omnipotence and benecence of God
as creator and ruler, his majesty and government, is presented in an unusual
light by the realism of the sufferer emphasizing rather the terrible and destructive aspects of the rule of God or, as in 9.4-10, his transcendence and aloofness
from the predicament of the worthy sufferer. They thus clinch Jobs arguments
against his friends by citations similar to their own in form but with quite a
different and quite legitimate application in the criticism of orthodox doctrine.
We may notice the same relationship to the didactic poem on the end of the
wicked which rounds out Zophars last statement (20.5-28) in Jobs statement
on the prosperity and peaceful end of the wicked in 21.7-26, which is too
obviously a parody of the didactic poem to be from any hand but the author of
the Book of Job. In view of the later adjustments in the interest of orthodoxy,
notably in the Elihu addendum, it is unlikely that a redactor would have
elaborated the trenchant parody of 20.5-28 and 21.7-26.
Baumgrtel further notes the double nature of most of Jobs statements not
only in respect of length but also of character. Besides Jobs long description
of his sufferings in the style of the Plaint of the Sufferer, he turns from the
address to his friends arguments to direct address to God (e.g. 7; 9.25-31;
10.2-27; 13.20-27; 14). Certain of such passages, like the hymns of praise and
didactic passages in the statement of the friends, fall at the end of Jobs
statements (e.g. 10.2-22; 13.20-27; 14), of which the rst and the last are not
strictly related to the thought of what precedes. In 9.25-31, too, the direct
address to God contrasts with the reference to God in the third person in 9.124, 32-35. But such passages could be rejected as secondary only on the
assumption that the Book of Job was a severely academic work limited to
strictly logical dialectic instead of the highly dramatic expression of the
existential situation of the worthy sufferer who believes in what tradition has
told him of the nature of a just God yet knows that what he suffers cannot be
reconciled with traditional doctrine. The personal involvement of the author in
this situation forces him to seek an answer in the presence of the living and
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74
beyond all traditional doctrine and the arguments of its representatives, and
that nds expression in the direct address to God in the interjections of a soul
in anguish.
The edifying narrative of Job which Ezekiel (14.14, 20) knew was probably
dominated by Jobs expression of faith and the maintenance of his integrity
despite the counsels of despair of his associates, but in his delimitation of the
Dialogue of the present Book by his drastic surgical operation Baumgrtel is
open to Baumgartners criticism that his work is vitiated by petitio principis
(Baumgartner 1951: 219). The sceptical aspect of the work before us is not the
result of a second hand in the denitive Book of Job, as Baumgrtel contends,
but characteristic of the authors own work. Indeed the questioning of the
condign signicance of the suffering of the worthy man may well have been
expressed in some degree even in the authors source, as it was expressed in
the Mesopotamian texts on the same subject, one of which was known in Syria
at Ugarit. Kraeling developed Baumgrtels thesis and carried it further. In the
immediate source of the present work which he dates c. 800 BCE he assumes a
dialogue where Job upheld his faith in divine justice and benecence despite
all doubts cast by his friends. The Dialogue, he suggests, was rewritten with
perhaps a more determined challenge to God from Job in condence of his
innocence. At this point Kraeling regarded the passages of the Plaint of the
Sufferer-type which admitted the sin of the sufferer (e.g. 7.1-10, 12-21; 9.2531; 10.1-22; 13.23-27) as accretions made to tone down Jobs challenge, a
view which does not admit the possibility, indeed the probability, that the sin
mentioned is hypothetical. With Jobs determined attack on the traditional
doctrine of Gods order in society in ch. 21, which provokes Eliphazs charges
in ch. 22, a sceptical note is introduced according to Kraeling (1938: 197)
which appears again in ch. 24. Accordingly he took chs. 2126 as part of a
sceptical redaction. There was, however, he suggests, a nal orthodox adjustment, represented by the inclusion of 27.2-12, this having been drawn from a
lost dialogue, the statement of the doctrine of retribution in 27.13-23, and the
independent poem on wisdom in ch. 28. He suggests that the nal effort to
counteract the scepticism which had crept into the Job tradition was the Divine
Declaration and Jobs nal submission, and, in view of the nal divine acceptance of Job, chs. 2931 were introduced, according to Kraeling, possibly from
the original dialogue as distinct from the earlier dialogue, that is Baumgrtels verdrngte Dialog. The whole was, he maintains, set in the framework
of the narrative in chs. 120 and 42.10-17 from an earlier version of the Job
tradition.
We nd no reason to doubt that the cause clbre of Job was much debated
over a considerable period in sapiential circles among the Jews with varying
emphasis, but we doubt Kraelings conclusion that the book, apart from the
major intrusions which we have noted (see above, pp. 52, 66), was not the
work of a single author, but the nal harvest of a number of books about the
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The Book of Job
75
ancient gure of Job (1938: 198). There seems no good reason why the artistic
achievement of a great creative poet and thinker should be made to disappear
in favour of such a complicated theory of adjustments and readjustments so
radical as to present a new and independent work.25
25. Gordis (1965: 110) objects to the view of extensive adjustments in the interests of
orthodoxy, stating that an offensive book would simply have been consigned to the geniza.
The Book of Job, however, was exceptional insofar as it represented an old traditional work
of orthodoxy which had been adapted by the author of the denitive Book in a much more
mature critical work. In view of the original tradition which survived as the framework of
the late sapiential work and of the divine approval of Job in the Epilogue there was no need
to adjust the Dialogue as a corrective to the criticism of orthodoxy.
1
Chapter 7
TEXT AND VERSIONS
The extant authority for the Hebrew text of the OT is admittedly late, not
indeed until the Aleppo Codex from the rst half of the tenth century CE. This
represents the same textual tradition as the Leningrad Codex from the Ben
Asher family of manuscripts, which is dated in 1008 CE. Variants in other
manuscripts from the same textual tradition have been noted by Kennicott and
de Rossi, but though those are extensive they are of relatively minor signicance, and in the Book of Job, where the MT raises many difculties and
doubts, seldom of themselves help to recover the original text. Standardization
in the MT was, evidently at least, well on course by the middle of the rst century CE on the evidence of such biblical portions as have survived at Qumran,
such as the Book of Isaiah from Cave 1 (1QIsa), which contains variants
though minor. Of two fragments of Samuel, however, from Cave 4, one
(4QSama) mainly agrees with the MT, while the other (4QSamb) differs from
the MT more widely, agreeing with the LXX (Cross 1956), where it varies from
MT. Unfortunately too little of Job has survived to serve our purpose. However, the general situation indicates that, while the Masoretic tradition of Job
must be respected, we must admit the possibility of variation of greater or less
signicance, as indicated in 4QSamb and the fragmentary targum of Job
(11QtargJob).
In assessing the value of the LXX variants for the appraisal of MT Job we
must consider the possibility of an early variant of the Hebrew text, as in
4QSamb. But our judgment must be modied owing to the known tendency of
the Greek translators to adjust the text in accordance with Greek literary tradition, pruning long repetitive passages in the interest of logical argument, or
adjustments in the interests of theological orthodoxy (e.g. 1.5; 5.18; 7.20; 9.4f.;
10.13; 12.6; 21.22; 22.2, 17; 23.15; 24.12; 27.2; 30.20-23; 31.35-37; 32.2; etc.).
Older Greek versions are available, extant in Origens Hexapla (c. 240 CE),
including the Hebrew text, Greek versions of Aquila, an Anatolian proselyte
to Judaism (c. 130 CE), of Symmachus, possibly an Ebionite or Jewish sectary
(c. 170 CE) and of Theodotion, a converted Jew (c. 200 CE). The last two,
being from Jews, have their own value; that of Aquila, if somewhat inelegant
and excessively literal, has by the same token a certain value for the recognition of the text he translated.
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The Latin Vulgate produced by Jerome in Bethlehem between 390 and 405
from Hebrew but with reference to the LXX and other Greek versions has
signicance as a direct translation from Hebrew and because of Jeromes local
knowledge of the Semitic milieu through long residence in Palestine and his
preoccupation with commentaries in the rest of the OT.
The Syriac version, or Peshitta, is attested in the Codex Ambrosianus (sixth
or seventh century CE). Produced as it was for a public in northern Syria and
Mesopotamia of kindred language, thought-forms and ethos to the Jews, it has
a signicant value for the assessment of the MT, and, especially in vocabulary,
provides a key to the solution of many an outstanding problem in Job.
The standard Aramaic version of Job in rabbinic Bibles is comparatively
late in the rst half of the rst millennium CE. This, however, is of limited
value as a clue to the reliability of the MT. As a development of oral rendering
and exposition of Scripture, targums are an indirect rather than a direct witness
to the original Hebrew text, and, with a fair amount of paraphrasing, they are
generally fuller than the MT. Aiming at edication in their own day, they
reect theological developments from the original text, the careful avoidance
of anthropomorphism in statements about God and in attitudes and reactions
natural to humans which the MT attributes to God, and many expressions of
human contention with God, as throughout Job, which even formally imply
anything other than Gods absolute transcendence and majesty are avoided,
even when that involves considerable variation from the Hebrew Vorlage.
Topical interests are also reected, and even in a sapiential work like Job
references to the history of Israel are found which were not in the intention of
the original. Thus for instance in 4.10,
CE
The lion may roar, the roarer cry aloud,

But the teeth of the great lions are done away,
the standard Targum equates the lions with Esau and Edom, like the robbers
in 12.6. In 5.5 His harvest is eaten by the hungry is amplied by a specic
reference to the Egyptians and Amalekites, a tradition possibly developed
from the role of the Amalekites in the introduction to the Gideon cycle (Judg.
6.3f.). In 5.23,
But with the waste stones you will make your pact,
And the weeds of the eld will be brought into concord with you,1
it relates the stones to the stone tablets of the Law and the weeds, which it
renders beasts, to the Canaanites. In 7.12,
Am I Sea or Tannin
That you set a guard over me?,
1. Suspecting eh in colon a as a homonym of eh (eld) in colon b, the style of
Job, we take it as cognate with Arab. sada(y) (forsaken, useless) and ayyat as weeds,
cognate with Arab. ayyun, which means both cultivated plants and weeds (Driver 1933:
44). See Commentary ad loc.
1
7. Text and Versions
78
the symbolic signicance of Sea and Tannin, the powers of Chaos in the
classical conict resulting in the demonstration of the effective Kingship of
God and the imposition of his government or order (mip) in its development
in the argument of Job, is quite lost in the Targum owing to its preoccupation
with the themes of the Pentateuch. Thus the Targum renders:
Am I guilty like the Egyptians who for their guilt were bound to be sunk in the
Reed Sea, or like Pharaoh who was drowned in the midst thereof for his sins?
Similar references to the episode at the Reed Sea are found in 14.11 and 26.13.
Indeed in a quite neutral reference to the sudden end of the wicked (34.20)
those are specied as Sodomites and Egyptians.
Again the Targum may reect current postexilic tradition, as when the
occasion of the heavenly court in the Prologue is specied as the judgment
day at the New Year, reecting the tradition noted in Tosefta Rosh HashShanah that the New Year was the occasion when all were judged and the fate
for the year settled. Similarly in Jobs curse on his day (3.6b),
Let it not be associated2 with the days of the year,
the Targum reads:

Let it not be included in the good days of the year!
This evidently reects the observance of memorable days in Jewish history

recorded in m. Taanith II.8 as days when mourning was forbidden (Dalman
1927: 1-3).
Midrashic accretions to Scripture are also reected. Thus the Shebans in the
Prologue (1.15) are specically associated with the Queen of Zemargad, a
tradition possibly developed from the tradition of the Queen of Sheba of
Solomons time. Jobs wife is actually named in the Targum to 2.9 as Dinah,
and in 2.11 the disasters of Job and his family are specied as the blasting of
his orchards, his wine turned to blood and his meat to living esh. In 32.2
Elihu is specied as a descendent of Abraham, and on 3.1,
The small and the great are there,
And the servant is free from his master,
the Targum is quite expansive:

Jacob, who was called the Young, and Abraham, who was called the Aged, are
there, and Isaac the servant of Yahweh who came out free from the place of
sacrice from the grasp of his hand.
And 25.2,
Dominion and fear are with him,
He makes all well in/from his heights,
2. Reading yad with Sym, V, T, and S for MT yiadd (rejoice).

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79
is amplied by a passage which depicts Michael at Gods right hand and

Gabriel on his left.
In such passages in the Targum, however, and in the case of the avoidance
of anthropomorphisms, it is usually simple to detect the Masoretic text to
which the adjustment or amplication is made.
There is a reference to a targum of Job before the middle of the rst century
CE (b. Shab. 115a).3 The use of an Aramaic targum on Job at this early date is
conrmed by the Qumran targum (11QtargJob), which antedates the abandonment of the settlement c. 68 CE, and has been dated by the editors on palaeographic grounds and by comparison of grammatical forms in the Aramaic parts
of Daniel as composed in the latter half of the second century (van der Ploeg
and van der Woude 1971: 2f.). On this dating 11QtargJob must be as old as, if
not older than, the LXX on Job, since the Greek translation of the Law itself
was effected c. 250 BCE.
This new text is fragmentary though fairly substantial, containing wholly or
partly the following sections of Job: 17.1418.4; 19.11-19; 19.2920.6; 21.210, 20-27; 22.3-9, 16-22; 24.12-17; 24.2426.2; 26.1027.4; 27.11-20; 28.413, 20-28; 29.7-16; 29.2430.4; 30.13-20; 30.2531.1; 31.8-16, 26-32; 31.40
32.3; 32.10-17; 33.6-16, 24-32; 34.6-17, 24-34; 35.6-15; 36.7-16, 23-33;
37.10-19; 38.3-13, 23-34; 39.1-11, 20-29; 40.5-14, 23-31; 41.7-17; 41.25
42.6; 42.9-11.
Fragmentary as it is, giving in the earlier parts only half couplets, but
towards the end whole couplets, for instance 33.10-17 and particularly from
37 to 42.11, it is possible to assess the nature and value of the targum and its
witness to the MT and to the LXX.
By comparison with the ofcial Targum, 11QtargJob is much more of a
direct translation, without specic references to the history or traditions of
Israel, current custom or Midrashic expansion, though it too has the tendency
to avoid anthropomorphism and anthropopathism in statements about God and
in demythologizing mythological references. Thus for instance in 38.7, where
MT reads,
When the morning stars cheered together
And all the divine beings shouted acclaim,
11QtargJob renders more soberly,

When the morning stars shone all together,
And all the angels of God shouted acclaim,
3. This relates that R. Gamaliel, the master of St Paul, who was so ill-pleased with a
targum of Job that he ordered a workman who was carrying out some repairs to build it into
a wall. This may reect his rejection of the targum as occasionally differing from the
Hebrew Vorlage or a prejudice against Job which was not yet admitted to the same status as
the Law and the Prophets, particularly in view of Jobs trenchant criticism of current
orthodoxy.
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to which we may compare the LXX:

When the stars were brought into being,
And my angels praised me with a loud voice.
In aiming at a direct translation for the most part 11QtargJob represents rather
the translation and exegesis which emerges as that of the Jewish community of
Alexandria in the LXX. It has in fact peculiar relevance to the debate on the
relation of the MT to the LXX and particularly the LXX before Origens
supplementation from Theodotion.4
The signicance of 11QtargJob for the appraisal of LXX and the relation of
both to the MT or to a variant Hebrew Vorlage may be now illustrated in detail
at some length, to which the reader is referred in the textual notes to our
translation and in our commentary.
In MT 17.16, badd el tranh im-yaa al-pr na (read na),
the problematic badd (bars) is called into question by LXX met emou and
by 11QtargJob hmy (with me), which respectively understand and express
the interrogative particle, which is omitted in MT. G.B. Gray had already
conjectured haimm (with me?). LXX and the Qumran targum may have
read this in a Vorlage different from MT, which in turn read bey or b,
which is used in this form in Phoenician inscriptions meaning with me as in
Ass. ina idi (lit. by my hand) beside me, which is cited by Dhorme. This
modication of MT badd may be retained on the principle lectio difcilior
potior, especially as it gives the obvious sense of the context which both
versions support and is graphically feasible as the original of MT badd. The
interrogative particle ha, included in 11QtargJob, was either omitted by
haplography after the nal h of the preceding word or was im as evidently
read by LXX and taken to mean or (eti).
In 18.2 MT a-nh temn qin lemilln the singular of the verb is read
by LXX and the Qumran targum, which is appropriate in view of Bildads
address to Job in vv. 4ff. We suggest the dittograph of n with corruption to w,
the verb being the energic imperfect in scriptio defectiva. The phrase qin
lemilln is suspect. qn would be a hapax legomenon in the OT though it might
be a cognate of Ass. qinu (fetter) as proposed by Zimmern (so Gesenius
Buhl, Friedrich Delitzsch, Dhorme, Hlscher, Kissane, Stevenson, Weiser,
Terrien); cf. Gordis and Pope, who propose, with less probability, Arab.
qanaa (to hunt), rendering respectively go hunting for words and set
word-snares. The construct before the noun with the proposition is indeed
attested in the OT before le and be, for example 24.5, meahar lareS and the
more frequent ye bre (GKC, 130a), but is still suspect. LXX and
4. Theodotion about the end of the second century BCE is thought to have revised one of
the current Greek translations, either the immediate predecessor of LXX (so A. Rahlfs) or
another (so P. Kahle), such as is exemplied by the Greek fragments of the Prophets and
Writings, but not Job, from the Wadi Murabbaat, which have been dated on palaeographic
evidence not later than the middle of the rst century BCE.
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11QtargJob agree in rendering stop (speaking), mechri ti ou paus (LXX) and

twy swp (11QtargJob). Therefore both, and the latter verbally, indicate a
reading q in the Vorlage, so understood by Ball and by Fohrer, who,
however, retains the construct plural ending. We suggest that qin may be a
scribal corruption of q through dittography of n before in the text represented the linear script of the sixth to the second century BCE.5 And that y of
qin is the corruption of an original in the same script, to be read before
lmlyn, thus qs el-milln.
In MT 18.3, madda nean kabbehmh nimn benkem, LXX omits
the verb in colon a and renders nimn or a variant in the Vorlage as we are
silent. In a fragmentary passage 11QtargJob indicates what this variant may
have been, reading lm (lb) yr dmyn (Why are we likened to brutes?). This
gives the required three beats in colon b, necessitating the third beat that MT
requires in the verb omitted in LXX. dmyn of the Qumran targum indicates that
LXX may have read dammn (we were silent) or nedammn (we were put
to silence) in the Vorlage. MT nimn, however, may be a scribal corruption
of neammn, the Niphal perfect of mam, unattested in the OT, but cognate
with Syr. mam (to be dull, obtuse), which occurs in this sense in Middle
Hebrew. Both versions may have attempted to render the rare verb mam by
the general sense through the assonance (but not phonetic correspondence) of
m and dm. The parallelism with nean suggests that, failing neammn in
the Vorlage, 11QtargJob dmynw is a more likely clue to nimnu (we are
likened to) in the Vorlage, which, in fact, was conjectured by Bickell, Beer
and G.B. Gray. It is signicant that neither version supports the reading of the
verb in MT as m (unclean), of which Fohrer takes MT mh as a byform.
In MT 19.12, yaa y geyw wayysll (read weysll) lay
darkm wayyaan (read weyaan) s leohol (his troops come on in
mass; they raise their ramp against me; they camp round my tent), for
geyw LXX reads peiratria (raiding parties) and l1QtargJob tpwhy (his
robbers). The context, with reference to a siege-ramp, supports MT geyw
rather than robbers. LXX peiratrion rendering MT ge in Gen. 49.19
supports MT geyw.
In the MT version of 19.17, r zrh leit (my breath is repugnant to my
wife), LXX reads I supplicate my wife and 11QtargJob I have bowed my
spirit before my wife, both agreeing in general sense. They seem to have read
grh in the Vorlage, meaning fear with the nuance of reverence or at least
deference (cf. yr // kabbe in Ps. 33.8). annt lien bin (I am
putrid to my own sons) in the parallel colon, however, supports MT zrh (is
repugnant), cognate with Ass. zru, which Haupt cited as expressing the
repugnance of a wife for her husband. The evidence of the two versions is that
in the Vorlage grh was a scribal corruption of zrh, though here, given the
5. E.g. the Lachish ostraca (588586 BCE), Aramaic papyri from Abu Sinjeh in the
Wadi Daliyeh (fourth century BCE) (Cross 1969) and Jewish coins from 135 BCE to 44 CE.
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82
early date of the versions and the still earlier date of the Vorlage, we admit
graphic difculties.6
In MT 22.17, hmerm ll sr mimmenn mah-yyipal adday lm
(read ln) (who say to God, Turn away from us, and What can the
Almighty do to us? ), LXX reads who say, What will the Lord do to us?,
and What will the Almighty bring upon us? and the Qumran targum in a
fragmentary text who say [ ] God [ ] to us. Both versions support ln in the
Vorlage, MT lm being an obvious scribal corruption of n to m in the Old
Hebrew script from the fth to the second century BCE. Both make theological
adjustments vis--vis MT.
In MT 24.24, wehumme akkol (and they droop like all), LXX reads but
he withers like the mauve plant (malak) in the heat; compare 11QtargJob [ ]
pepw kybl. LXX suggests the singular of the verb, which would generally agree
with the context. This would indicate wehumma in the Vorlage, suggesting
that nal w in MT is a dittograph after k in the linear script of the fth to the
fourth century BCE. A plant is surely denoted in colon b, as indicated in LXX.
The Qumran targum species kybl, surely the dog-tooth klh, identied by
I. Lw (1881: 230), of which MT kkl is a corruption of the Vorlage of the
Qumran version.
MT 25.2 exemplies a case where the Qumran targum conrms the MT,
while the LXX seems to suggest a different Vorlage, though the difference is
more apparent than real. MT reads haml waa imm (effective rule7 and
terror are in his power [lit. with him]). This is conrmed by 11QtargJob
which reads, ln wrbw m lh, provided we understand rbw as cognate with
Arab. rba, yrb (cf. Ass. rbu, to quake), rendering With God is authority
and terror, which would agree with LXX phobos. But this meaning of rb has
yet to be attested in Aramaic, and the probability is, we consider, that rbw
means greatness, complementary to ln. This would be a paraphrase rather
than direct translation which generally characterizes 11QtargJob. LXX offers
the strange reading, ti gar prooimion phobos par autou (For what prelude
or fear proceed from him?). Strangely enough, prooimion may support MT
haml, the innitive absolute Hiphil of mal (to rule), since it is a synonym
of arch (beginning and rule), though we suspect that it is a variant or a
corruption in the transmission of LXX of paroimion (proverb or example),
Hebrew ml. This is not the only case where an apparently widely divergent
Greek rendering in LXX really supports the view that the Hebrew Vorlage was
MT and not a variant Hebrew text.
MT 25.3 reads hay mispr lieyw weal-m l-yqm rh (Is there
any counting of his troops? And against whom does his light not rise?), which
the LXX renders Has anyone supposed (hupolaboi) that there is escape
6. But cf. the corruption of z to g in Amos 7.1: MT gizz hammele (the kings
mowings) to King Gog in LXX (Hebrew g hammele).
7. Literally imposition of rule.
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(parelkusis) from his troops? In colon a 11QtargJob reads rn for MT mispr.

rn means trust or promise, hence hope, Hebrew sbr, of which MT
mispr may be a corruption. In colon b w l mn l tqwm kmntw supports LXX
enedra (ambush), indicating reh, of which MT rh is a corruption,
with omission of b after r through haplography in the script attested in
Egyptian papyri of the fth to rst century BCE.
An emendation of MT 30.17 is suggested by the agreement of the Qumran
targum with LXX before corruption of the latter. MT layelh amay niqqar
mly gives no feasible sense in the context. The Qumran text is fragmentary in the passage, but reads gmry yqdwn (My bones are inamed). LXX
reads nukti de mou ta ostea sugkechutai (At night my bones are dissolved).
But the verb may be a corruption of sugkekautai, which is preferred by A.
Rahlfs, thus establishing agreement with 11QtargJob and indicating the
corruption of niqqad to niqqar in MT. This in turn suggests the emendation of
MT mly (from upon me) to mal (than a cauldron) as suggested by
Dahood, assuming al as a cognate of Arab. ala(y), alayatu(n) (cookingpot); compare lh in this sense noticed by G.R. Driver (1954: 304) in Ezek.
38.18, thus giving the passage the excellent sense at night my bones are hotter
than a cauldron.
MT 34.9 reads l yiskon- (read yisskn) geer bire im-elhm (A
man has no advantage by his giving satisfaction to God), for which
11QtargJob offers the reading l ynh gbr my though it is too fragmentary to
indicate the Vorlage of ynh (changes or attains eminence) or its restoration
or adjustment. But in LXX ouk estin episkop andros the noun episcop
(oversight), corroborates the consonants skn of MT; cf. Hebrew sn
(steward, Isa. 22.15).
In MT 35.10 ayyh elah y (read ) nn zemir ballyelh the
noun zemir has caused misapprehension in English translations, the reading
songs in the night perhaps unduly inuenced by the experience of Paul and
Silas at Philippi (Acts 16.25) and the meaning of the root in Amos 5.23; Pss.
81.9; 95.2, and so on, and Arab. zamara (to play music, specically on a
wind-instrument). Alternatively the noun is taken as strength, courage,
cognate of Arabic mira, or, as suggested by D.W. Thomas (193637: 478),
protection. The root in Hebrew zmr in such a sense is surely a component of
the proper names cited by James Barr (1968: 182), blzmr and zmryhw from
the Samaritan ostraca and Zimri. The sense protection is understood in LXX,
which renders phulakas (guards), evidently misunderstanding the Hebrew
feminine plural as signifying the abstract singular, and in 11QtargJob lh
] lnbt hlyly. The context and LXX phulakas indicate that
dylq ln l [
the Aramaic nbt is cognate with Hebrew ne in 2 Sam. 8.6, 14; 1 Chron.
18.13 and 2 Chron. 17.2, which denotes watchposts or detachments posted by
David in occupied territory and in the homeland for defence, being rendered
phroura in LXX. This sense of Hebrew zmr in Exodus 15 was recognized by
LXX in the translation of ozz wezimer yh (read z wezimera yh) as bothos
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kai skepasts (a help and protector), where z, as well as its complement

zimera, has an Arabic cognate awau(n) (protection); compare the exclamation nau billhi (May God protect us!).
In MT 37.13 im-lee im-lear (read ar) im-leese (Whether for
chastisement [lit. a rod] or for favour or in token of steadfast grace), for
lese the versions are more specic, the Qumran targum reading lmkt (to
bruise, or beat) and LXX eis paideian (for discipline); compare e in
Prov. 22.14; 29.15. But for MT lear LXX renders for his land, which the
Qumran targum also evidently understood, in rendering lr, thus misunderstanding ar (favour) as a cognate of Arabic rawu(n); compare the
Palmyrene deity ar, Monimus in the Latin translation (cf. Arabic munim,
gracious; see Commentary ad loc). LXX eis eleos is a direct translation of MT
leese, but the Qumran targum reads lsrhh (for our want), amplifying by
lkpn (for famine). The divergence from MT, however, is readily comprehensible on the assumption of the mistaking of the nal d of ese for r.
In MT 39.10, haiqor-rym beelem a im-yeaddr amqm aharey,
we suspect the meter as too long; the collocation of beelem a is also
suspect, as is a if, as LXX assumes, it means ropes, lacking as it does a
preposition and having the singular pronominal sufx with the plural noun.
rym, pointed in MT as if rem, is suspect on two countsthe spelling and the
repetition of the noun after rem in the preceding verse. The evidence of LXX
and 11QtargJob may now be adduced. LXX reads:
Will you bind his yoke with thongs?
Or will he draw your furrows in the plain?
The Qumran targum reads htqr rm btryh wylg(wn) bbq btryk. Both versions
omit explicit mention of furrow (elem) in colon a, where it probably crept
into MT as an explanatory gloss on a rare word in the bicolon, which we
suspect to be Aram. arey (cf. Syr. rat, to split). The verb weylg(wn) in
11QtargJob, if it means to make a narrow track, the meaning of Aram. lagn
given by M. Jastrow (1903), may render the verb in colon b yeadd, a rare
word, found only here and in Isa. 28.24 and Hos. 10.11, where it is parallel to,
and probably a synonym of ra (to plough), possibly with the sense of
drawing a straight furrow; compare Arab. adda (to be straight). Still in
colon b, MT aarey, which is not indicated in LXX, is assumed by
11QtargJob to mean after you, which disagrees with ploughing. We suggest
that it is a corruption of areyk (Aram. your furrows), the object of the
verb yeadd. To revert to colon a, with the removal of elem as a gloss, the
regular three-beat metre would be restored and e then be attached to a,
which, without a preposition, is a problem. LXX understands this word, without
a preposition and signicantly without the pronominal sufx, as thongs or
ropes, which may have been suggested by Isa. 5.18. But here the pronominal
sufx with the plural is suspect. We suggest therefore that a is the verbal
noun of h (to be thick), with which the pronominal sufx would be
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regular, meaning his thickness or his massive bulk, with specic reference
to the bull-neck of the animal, the forequarters of the bull including the neck,
which is markedly more massive than the hind quarters. This may possibly be
suggested by 11QtargJob btwryh, possibly his bull-like strength. MT rm is
also omitted in LXX, where his yoke suggests an original nr of which rm
may be a scribal error of metathesis, with corruption of n to m in the Old
Hebrew script. The Vorlage of LXX would then have been haiqor-nr
baa (Will you bind a yoke on his massive bulk?). This and other
variations in LXX and the Qumran targum in this passage alone indicate that
each used a different Hebrew Vorlage with substantial variations from MT. In
conclusion we propose an original reading of the couplet:
haiqor-nr baa
Will you bind a yoke on his massive bulk?
im-y eaddd bmeq arey
Will he plough your furrows straight in the plain?
MT 40.26 reads ham agmn beapp. LXX and 11QtargJob differ from
MT agmn in reading respectively krikon (a ring) and zmm (cf. Syr. zmm
and Arab. zammu[n], bridle), which would give an excellent sense in the
context. MT agmn is not an impossible corruption of zmm or zmn;
compare LXX g hammele for gizz hammele in Amos 7.2. So long as the
crocodiles mouth can open, a ring (LXX) or hook (T) is pointless. Hence the
snout must rst be bound. It is important to note that the text refers not to the
crocodiles mouth (pw) but to his snout (app).
In 41.26 the crocodile is described as mele al-kol-ben-a (king over
all the big game); compare ben-a in 28.8 (see Commentary ad loc.). LXX
and the Qumran targum agree in disagreeing with MT, reading respectively
king over all those that are in the water (cf. T little shes) and over all
the reptiles (al kl r [Syr. ra]); compare S r. While a naturalistic
description of the crocodile, the scribal corruption of r or r is not graphically feasible. It is less than what MT says, which may reect the allusion to
the crocodile as the beast par excellence implied in the crocodile as the hieroglyphic sign for king, as Fohrer notes (1989: 531) after A. Erman (1894:
180). It would appear that the targums and LXX missed this point in their
Vorlage or that their Vorlage differed from MT. 11QtargJob shows an interesting correspondence with LXX, apparently as against MT, in 42.11, where Jobs
kinsmen, visiting him after his rehabilitation, present him with a lamb (Aram.
mr, LXX amnn, cf. MT qeh). Since a hundred qe are given as the price
of the ground acquired by Jacob at Shechem (Gen. 33.19), Job 42.11 is
probably a case of conscious archaizing. On the basis of LXX, now supported
by the Qumran targum, Dhorme (ad loc.) elaborated the view that a qeh
was a lamb as a unit of exchange, citing the semantic analogy of Latin pecunia
(money) from pecus (cattle).
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42.6 reads al-kn emas weniamt al-r wer (therefore I

despise/reject and repent on dust and ashes). As indicated by the athna in
weniamt the Masoretes understood this verb to end colon a. In this case colon
b must be admitted as decient of a beat. If, pace MT, weniamt or its original
is taken as the rst word in colon b, the verb required before al-r weer,
this leaves colon a short of a beat, while according to MT the transitive Qal
emas is without an object. It might be assumed that as an object my words
might be implied when Job rejected his case, but this still does not meet the
objection to the short meter if niamt or its original is taken with colon b, and
the same would apply to the reading emms, which would avoid the difculty of the transitive verb in the Qal without an object. The metrical difculty
would be met by assuming the reading himms emms (I utterly demean
myself), which would agree with Jobs repentance (sitting) on dust and ashes.
Here we may cite the evidence of LXX and 11QtargJob. LXX reads
ephaulisa emauton kai etakn hgmai de eg emauton gn kai spodon (I
demean myself and am dissolved, I consider myself dust and ashes); compare
11QtargJob, l kn tnsk wtmh whw lpr wqm (lit. Therefore I am poured
out and reduced [lit. diluted8] and I have become dust and ashes). Here LXX
ephaulisa emauton supports the reading emms, while etakn indicates
emmas from msas (to melt, dissolve), which was in fact conjectured by
Beer, who proposed himms emmas, thus restoring the three-beat meter in
colon a, omitting weniamt or its original. The verb msas in the Niphal is
indicated in the Qumran targum, which reads colon a l kn tnsk wtmh (lit. I
am poured out and diluted). This suggests an original of MT weniamt as
wenimht, cognate of Aram. meh or an Aramaism in Job. The sense of this
verb in 11QtargJob and LXX etakn would support Beers conjecture. But LXX
ephaulisa emauton supports MT emas read emms. Our conclusion in
colon a is that in view of the familiar word-play so dear to the author of Job,
the original of this colon was al-kn emms weemmas (Therefore I
demean myself and yield, lit. melt, lose coherence, hence yield in the
physical sense). Both versions supply the verb required in colon b, LXX I
considered myself and the Qumran targum I have become, both of which we
nd in the context quite colourless. The original may have been nihm
(corrupted to niamt in MT), which the Qumran targum read and included in
colon a. We suggest an original text:
MT
al-kn emms weemmas

wenimh al-r weer
Wherefore I demean myself and yield,
and am reduced to dust and ashes.
Possibly the targumist took emms and emmas as alternative readings and
omitted emms and included wenimhet of his Vorlage in colon a supplying
8. See Dalman 1938: 226a.
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the verb hw in colon b (metri causa), while LXX took emmas and nimh as
alternatives and omitted the latter, supplying the missing beat in colon b with
kai hgmai.
Finally in the Epilogue 11QtargJob makes a valuable contribution to the
problem of the composition and transmission of the Book of Job, in ending at
42.11 of MT. Here there is no question of a fragmentary text since the targum
ends here in the middle of column 38 of the scroll and nothing further is
written in this line or in the space left in the column. The rather naive reference to Jobs material restitution, which has always offended spiritual sensibilities, may, of course have been omitted for theological reasons. But it
probably indicates that the Book of Job as the targumist knew it in the late
second century BCE ended at 42.11, the rest being a later midrashic expansion,
like the Syriac book to which LXX refers (ed. Swete, 42.17 b-e), indicating a
certain uidity of the Job tradition at this point. The necessity for the LXX
version of the Hebrew Scripture and the translation of Ben Siras work into
Greek indicates that since c. 250 BCE and probably earlier the Jews in Egypt
were more familiar with Greek than with Hebrew, and particularly with the
less familiar words in a poetic work like Job, such as the many homonyms
which characterize the book. Indeed, even among Hebrew speakers in Palestine it is not to be expected that all nuances of the living language of c. 450
BCE, when we should date the Book of Job, should have been familiar even
three centuries later any more than most average English speakers should
know what the Authorized Version meant by earing (ploughing) in Exod.
34.21. But, produced in Palestine, where Hebrew and Aramaic were living languages, the Qumran targumist was on more familiar ground and is noticeably
more faithful to the Hebrew Vorlage.
In Job, which so fully exploits the resources of Hebrew language and
current Aramaic, students of the book, from the starting point of the more
familiar content of Hebrew language, soon nd it necessary to have recourse
to the versions where an unfamiliar word occurs or where the sense seems
to break down. If directly or indirectly they do not solve the problem they
may have recourse to Comparative Semitic Philology, using the increasing
resources of cognate Semitic languages, Akkadian, Amorite from Mari,
Assyrian, Ugaritic, Phoenician, Aramaic, Syriac, Arabic and Ethiopic with
South Arabian dialects from the latter half of the rst millennium BCE. This
may at once solve the problem, giving the obvious sense in the context and
agreeing with other passages in the OT. This is particularly the case where, as
often in Job, apparently the same word is used in a couplet in parallelism, a
solecism which the poet would surely never have committed even occasionally.
Failing such help, we may have recourse to emendation, and here again the
ingenuity of the scholar must be subject to control. A version, even where it
does not give direct help, may yet give a clue to the original which it has
misunderstood, and here the deciency of one version may, and indeed must,
be checked against another, as we have noticed in our citation of LXX and
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11QtargJob. Subject to such controls, conjectural emendation must be

graphically feasible, its characters relating to those of the dubious text, for
scribal corruption did occur. The corruption may be a wrong arrangement of
consonants as in 42.6, where on the clue of 11QtargJob which reads wtmh
we may suspect such a corruption with the further corruption of h to , MT
weniamt being suggested to the scribe by emms in colon a. The
emendation to wenimh suggested by the Qumran targum and read in colon
b, together with LXX and 11QtargJob supports Beers conjecture emmas for
MT emas in colon a, where, reading MT weniamt in colon b, he supplied the
metric deciency in colon a by proposing himms emmas. This conjecture,
however, must be modied by the support for MT emas, read emms (I
demean myself) in LXX. Finally, in support of the reading al-kn emms
weemmas wenimh al-pr weer, appeal to the general style of the
poetic author of Job in his fondness for word-play exemplied in the collocation of emms and emmas (lit. demean myself and am dissolved, sc. lose
coherence). The sense of the second member of such a pair is amplied in the
next verb wenimh (lit. and I am diluted, sc. reduced) in a convention
well known in Arabic poetry and rhetoric as tawriya, cited by Guillaume
(1963) in the case of homonyms, to which emms and emmas, though not
homonyms, vocally approximate. Beers conjecture is thus controlled by
metrical considerations, but modied by the support of LXX, for MT emms
in the consonantal text, and with due recognition of the poetic style of Job, MT
weniamt read by the Masoretes in colon a and conjectured to belong to colon
b is a corruption of wenimht, suggested by 11QtargJob, and supported by the
meaning of the sense of emmas in colon a on the analogy of tawriya in Arabic
poetry.
In considering the graphic feasibility of an emendation we must reckon with
the origin and transmission of a text. If the denitive Book of Job was
composed c. 450 BCE with later addenda until c. 400 BCE it is reasonable to
suppose that it was written in the Old Hebrew script attested in the Lachish
Ostraca (588586 BCE) and in Aramaic Papyri from the Wadi Daliyeh (fourth
century BCE). At Qumran from the last quarter of the second century BCE, this
script was replaced by one not far removed from that familiar in our printed
Bibles. But the older Hebrew script is still attested at Qumran in certain
fragments from Caves 1 and 4 and was used in Jewish coinage from 135 BCE
to 44 CE and in coins from the revolt of Bar Coseba (132135 CE). Thus it
might be supposed that if the Book of Job was composed and transmitted in
Palestine, it may have had currency in the Old Hebrew script, while, if it was
composed and transmitted in Egypt, we must reckon with the development of
this script as attested in the development of that script as attested in Egyptian
papyri from the fth century BCE. On the other hand, the direct ancestor of the
developed Hebrew alphabet, which betrays its origin among the exiles in
Mesopotamia by the term the Assyrian script, known also as the square
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script, generally adapted at Qumran, was evidently brought to Palestine by

Jews returning from Exile from the middle of the sixth century BCE. Developed by Jewish intelligentsia in Mesopotamia keenly concerned to conserve
their scriptural heritage, this may well have set the pattern in the west for
scriptural manuscripts, including the Book of Job. Be that as it may, we shall
nd obvious cases where the recovery of the original text is graphically
explicable on the assumption of scribal corruption in the Old Hebrew script,
while other cases indicate the square script as attested in its development in the
bulk of the Qumran manuscripts or later, while that of the Egyptian papyri is
not out of the reckoning.
Some emendations of the consonantal text by the application of epigraphy
or calligraphy will be relatively simple and obvious, but in the case of others
which are more complex we must apply the checks we have mentioned, always
mindful that once corruption has occurred, especially in a difcult textand
those are any which bafed the versions in Jobcorruption may proliferate. A
notable example of this we would nd in the description of the splendid burial
of the prosperous wicked in 21.33: meq-l rie naal (Sweet to him are
the clods of the wadi), which we nd quite unHebraic and not apt in the
context. We have suggested the emendation miqnn be well (Having
provided for his elegy to the accompaniment of ute and pipe). We nd it
signicant in the context that in the elaborate funeral this essential element is
the sole omission. Here we may note the correspondence of most of the
consonants to MT. Others in the emendation, such as n for w and m for n are
simple scribal errors in the Old Hebrew script, and w for y in well in
the square script; equally simple is dittography as in miqnn. This leaves in
as the outstanding difculty, for which there is no obvious graphic
relation to the MT at any stage of the script, and this we explain as a case of
proliferating corruption of an already corrupted text. Here the most helpful
11QtargJob is unfortunately fragmentary.
We must notice the contribution of comparative philology to the assessment
of the MT, with special reference to conjectural emendation. This resort, once
so freely exercised, seemed to nd a fruitful eld in Job with its outstanding
abundance of hapax legomena and words formally known in Hebrew but in
their familiar sense incongruous with the context. This applies particularly to
the apparent repetition of a word in corresponding position in parallel cola. In
the frequency of such cases in Job we may be sure that this was no literary
lapse, but was a deliberate stylistic convention, which Guillaume did well to
note as a feature of Arabic poetry and rhetoric. That such word-play was
known in Israel is evidenced by Samsons riddle (Judg. 14.14),
Out of the eater came forth meat,
Out of the strong came forth sweet,
with its answer,

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What is sweeter than honey (ary)?9

What is stronger than a lion (ar)?,
and Judg. 15.16,

With the jawbone of an ass (amr), heap upon heap (amryim)
The formally identical words in parallelism in Job prove to be such homonyms, formally identical yet quite different in meaning, like the English sole,
meaning part of a foot, a sh, and only. In Hebrew the unfamiliar member of
such a pair is to be recognized from a cognate either in Aramaic, Syriac,
Northern Arabic, or Ethiopic or one of the Southern Arabian dialects which
would indicate the obvious sense in the context, which must of course be the
nal criterion. The recognition of this stylistic feature in Job and the application of comparative Semitic philology has severely limited the exercise of
conjectural emendation of the MT.
The order of the MT has often been called in question by practically every
serious commentator on Job, and usually a displacement of text is taken to
have occurred, as for instance in a tricolon where a colon is out of accord, or
seems to be, with its context and where it gives more sense in another position.
Such an exercise can be quite subjective if we may judge by the difference of
opinion as to where the assumed errant block originally belonged. Such a
question may often be objectively settled by the appreciation of the style of the
poet, who, like the poets in the Ras Shamra myths and legends, used the tricolon occasionally to punctuate their text which was usually in bicola. Thus in
Job we nd that the tricolon frequently marks the end of a theme, as we nd
regularly once we have resolved the various chapters into strophes, either
thematically or on form-critical grounds, as Fohrer has so admirably done.
Thus, while an odd colon in a prevailing arrangement of bicola may suggest to
the critic a rearrangement of the text of the MT exercised, one would hope, in
accord with the sense of the context and with the minimum of subjective judgment, this tendency is modied if not minimized by the real signicance of the
odd tricolon among the predominant bicola.
In cases where displacement of text is assumed it must be admitted that this
is proposed ad sensum, but a signicant criterion is also the style of the author.
For instance in 20.10 between the statement of the evanescence of the wicked
and his prosperity in vv. 9 and 11 the MT reads,
bnyw yera allm weyyw tnh n
His sons crush the poor but his hands will give back his wealth,
while in the statement of the prosperous wicked to enjoy his prots in 20.19
MT reads:
k-riss za dallm bayi gzal wel yienh.
9. Cognate of Arab aryu(n).
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For the unintelligible za we propose zm (by force). The fondness of
the poet for word-play suggests the emendation of yera in v. 10, yire
(they will make restitutions), a parallel to yyw tnh, with further
word-play between bnh (MT yienh). This suggests that vv. 19 and 10
belong together in that order:
19. k-ris zm dallm bayi gzal l bnh
10. bnyw yire dallm weydyw tbnh n
Since he has crushed the poor by force, plundered a house which he had not
built,
His sons will have to make restitution to the poor, and his own hands give back
his wealth.
The word-play between bnyw and bnhu indicates the chiastic arrangement
of the two bicola, which we would place after v. 18.
With the multiple aid of all such disciplines, the study of versions, epigraphy and calligraphy, comparative philology, prosody and the appreciation of
the stylistic idiom of the author, we may and must make our approach to the
assessment of the MT or to the recovery of the original after scribal corruption
in transmission. At certain disputed points the MT will be supported against
proposed conjectural emendation; at others a more meaningful original will be
recovered. In all cases both support and emendation of the MT must be under
strict and indeed multiple control.
Chapter 8
THE LANGUAGE OF THE BOOK OF JOB
The Book of Job, a masterpiece in Hebrew literature, exhibits a wide range of

language, with an extraordinary number of rare words and hapax legomena.
These have always been a problem to commentators, together with passages
either obscure in themselves or through scribal corruption, which have occasioned copious emendation often more ingenious than controlled. Such
passages are sometimes reconstructed from Hebrew diction, phraseology or
sentiment familiar elsewhere in the OT preferably in similar contexts; more
often they proceed from the assumption of a hitherto unknown or doubtful
Hebrew word as cognate with one in one of the kindred Semitic languages or
even as not a Hebrew word at all but an importan Aramaism for instance,
or an Arabism. Some of such suggestions, like conjectural emendation, have
reected the interest and expertise more or less in those languages rather than
deep appreciation of Hebrew language and literature.
All such attempts to arrive at the form and meaning of the original must
employ all available checks. The proposed reconstruction must be assessed
with relation to its immediate context and other parts of the work studied and
other parts of the OT reected or consciously cited or alluded to, as particularly in Job, where the writer makes such ample use of known literary forms
with their conventional diction, imagery and association of thought (see above,
pp. 39-55). The ancient versions, the LXX, S, V, T and now the earliest known
version, the Aramaic targum from Qumran, 11QtargJob, may supply a
measure of the desired control. When in addition the effort is made to solve an
outstanding problem or to elucidate a text in the OT by the citation of cognate
Semitic languages, words cited from such sources must be cited wherever
possible with due regard to their native context.
Here we are fortunate to possess such a volume of material from Akkadian
texts of various character from southern Mesopotamia, early in the second
millennium BCE, from Mari just before the middle of that millennium in an
Amorite dialect, Assyrian texts contemporary with the history of Israel,
Canaanite citations and glosses in the Amarna Tablets from Syria and Palestine from the fourteenth century BCE, and administrative texts and poetic
myths and legends from Ras Shamra with vocabulary, grammar, gures and
forms of prosody so close to Hebrew (particularly Hebrew poetry) that a
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Hebrew prophet could speak of his language as the language of Canaan (Isa.
19.18). Contemporary with the appearance of the Book of Job, Aramaic, the
lingua franca of Persian administration in western Asia and Egypt is well
attested in documents both administrative and domestic, from Elephantine and
in letters found in the Wadi Daliyeh and dated in the fourth century BCE (Cross
1969). From the Christian era there is a great volume of Syriac in the targum
to the OT and the direct translation of the Testament, and original works such
as patristic literature, mediaeval history and a work on agriculture (Geoponicum). Any commentary on Job teems with citation of Arabic, either conjectures as to the meaning of hapax legomena or rare or doubtful words
unattested in what is known of Hebrew or its obvious cognates. Many of these
will be supported by citation of cognates in one or more of the kindred Semitic
languages just mentioned, though regrettably this has not always been done.
Despite occasional over-emphasis and exclusive application of Arabic it does
occupy a very signicant place in a philological approach to the linguistic
problems of Job.
The Arabic element in Job was rst suggested by the mediaeval Jewish
commentator ibn Ezra, who suggested that the linguistic peculiarities of the
Book of Job, which had long been the despair of Jewish rabbis, arose from its
character as a translation. This was taken up and argued by D.S. Margoliouth
and F.H. Foster, who argued for an Arabic original (Margoliouth 1924; Foster
193233: 21-45). However we may evaluate Arabic in the study of Job, this
explanation is most unlikely. R. Gordis (1965: 210), rightly in our opinion,
argues that there is nothing known in Arab culture in the pre-Christian era
which could have given birth to such a work as Job or which could have
evoked such emulation in an advanced Hebrew society as to demand
translation.
Arabisms in Job were more recently claimed by the late A. Guillaume1 in
explanation of the many cases where apparently identical words are used in
parallelism. With this great wealth of vocabulary it is rightly argued that it is
inconceivable that the poet should have lapsed to this extent in the short
compass of a couplet. In qualication it must be noticed that occasionally
identical words in parallelism do occur in Ugaritic poetry in the cuneiform
texts where there is no question of textual corruption. In such cases the word is
repeated for the sake of emphasis. In Job, however, this is relatively rare. In
such cases Guillaume recognized that the words were not synonyms but homonyms. He took the rst as Hebrew and the second as Arabic with a different
meaning. This is a conscious word-play exemplied outside Job in Ps. 137.5f.:
im-ek yerlyim
tika yemn
If I forget thee, O Jerusalem,

Let my right hand wither away.2
1. Guillaume 1954: 1-12; 1963; 1965: I, 3-35; II, 5-35; III, 1-10; IV, 1-18.
2. The verb a in this sense, in our opinion, has an Ugaritic cognate, for example, in
Gordon UT 67 I.4, 30f., tk ttrp mm (the heavens will dry up, yea languish); so also
Driver 1956a; Gibson, ad loc. (burnt up); cf. Pope 1966: 240.
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8. The Language of the Book of Job
This literary convention is used much more frequently in Arabic poetry and
rhetoric, and is found in Job more often than in any other book in the OT.
From this fact Guillaume goes on to argue that the writer and his circle were
bilingual and indeed that the book was produced in the Hejaz (see above, p. 4).
Though the clue to one or other of the homonymsusually the secondis
frequently found in Arabic, this does not mean that the word is an Arabism, as
Guillaume concluded; it may have an Aramaic cognate as well as, or even
rather than, an Arabic one or a cognate in Ugaritic, which Guillaume persistently ignored. In this case the word in question is probably genuinely Hebrew,
an element in fact of sea kenaan (Isa. 19.18). We are even less convinced by
Guillaumes conclusion that his Arabisms indicate the provenance of the
Book of Job from the Hejaz.
The weakness of Guillaumes thesis of extensive Arabic inuence in Job is
that his alleged Arabisms are cited from Classical Arabic at least a millennium after the composition of Job, and there is nothing contemporary except
possibly short inscriptions, little more in fact than mere grafti of uncertain
and probably much later date.3 That, of course, does not exclude Arabic as the
medium of communication in daily life and in oral tradition. In fact the full
owering of Arabic poetry with its elaborate structure and polished, precise
diction in the pre-literary period just before Islam in the seventh century CE
implies a long period of currency of Arabic in the peninsula, while in the south
the language is attested in its local expression in numerous inscriptions in the
ruinelds of the south Arabian kingdoms from the tenth century BCE.4
When all this is said, however, of all the resources of comparative Semitic
philology, the signicance of Arabic must be admitted. North or Hejazi
Arabic, attested in sophisticated poetry before the seventh century CE, is used
in all its fullness and uency in the Quran and in traditions of early Islam and
subsequently in jurisprudence, history and science to modern times, with
current books, periodicals and newspapers. There are of course specic developments in the meaning of words to say nothing of coinage, which, however,
in the immense resources of the language, are relatively rare and readily
detected. In invoking Arabic in explication of passages in the OT, however, due regard must be paid to the use of Arabic words and roots in their
living context, as in the profuse citations in the lexica of LanePoole
(186393) and Freytag (183037) and authoritative works of native Arab
3. Van den Branden 1956. On the basis of his understanding of the development of the
Old Arabian script F.V. Winnett proposed to date such inscriptions from Teima and its
vicinity not later than the sixth century BCE. This date is supported by no local evidence
from northern Arabia, but a closely related script from southern Iraq in an archaeological
context dated to the eighth or seventh century was found; see Driver, 1944b: 124; Albright
1965. Relatively to this, Winnett dates his inscriptions in the Taymanite script; see
Winnett and Reed 1970: 99-103.
4. On the application of Southern Arabic and Ethiopic in Semitic Philology, see
Ullendorff 1956 and Beeston 1962.
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95
lexicographers.5 There is furthermore the opportunity to hear and communicate in spoken Arabic in a living Semitic milieu, particularly, from the point of
view of the Hebraist, in the local dialects of Palestine and Syria. Here we may
pay tribute to Gustaf Dalman, our teacher in the University of Greifswald, in
his monumental Arbeit und Sitte in Palastina (192839), where he cites verbal
communications to him in the practical situations of peasants and humble folk,
with profuse citation of relevant passages in the OT, Targum, Talmud and
Midrash which makes this work an invaluable supplement to his Aramischneuhebrisches Handwrterbuch zu Targum, Talmud und Midrasch (1938).
Thus the many words in Job where the familiar sense of Hebrew is not
applicable may reasonably be invested with meaning on the assumption of an
Arabic cognate, always, however, subject to congruity with the context. This
has informed an impressive series of studies by G.R. Driver from 1922 to
1955,6 which are reected in NEB, and by I. Eitan (1924), J. Reider7 and D.W.
Thomas.8 In many, if not indeed most cases, however, Arabic does not offer
the only cognate with a Hebrew word. Cognates in other Semitic languages
suggest themselves, which may indeed conrm the evidence of Arabic
adduced, but may occasionally modify it. We nd that this applies particularly
to the work of Guillaume. Notwithstanding his many brilliant insights, he
declared, in defence of the MT in Job against what he alleged to be deliberate
falsication of the evidence in an appalling degree that he would be determined to read it as an Arabic work (Guillaume 1963: 108).
In discussing the Aramaic element in Job we would dismiss Tur-Sinais
thesis of an Aramaic original and Hebrew translation (Tur-Sinai 1957). This is
surely exploded by the uent application of literary forms with relation to their
Sitz im Leben, and the characteristic language, imagery and themes of Hebrew
literature. Moreover the ample evidence we shall cite of the elements of
Ugaritic, a dialect of the tongue of Canaan with which the prophet classied
Hebrew (Isa. 19.18), surely militates against the thesis of an Aramaic original
and a subsequent Hebrew translation. Such an original would never have
exhibited such features, nor would the alleged Hebrew translation in the fth
century BCE. In this respect the Book of Job is a natural development of biblical, particularly the Wisdom, tradition and idiom and in the language and
literary tradition of ancient Canaan to which Hebrew poets were heirs.
Moreover in Mesopotamia, where Tur-Sinai has suggested that the book was
produced in Aramaic (at a period of activity in assembling and editing the
considerable literary deposit of Hebrew from before the Exile and when and
5. Ibn Manur, Lisnul-arab, 12321311; al-Frzbd, al-Qmsu l-Mu, 1326
1414; Murad z-Zabd, Tju l-ars, 173291.
6. Drivers work is cited throughout the Commentary; cf. also his Hebrew Poetic
Diction (1956b).
7. J. Reider, articles in HUCA from 1925 to 1953; VT 4 (1954); JJS 3 (1956).
8. D.W. Thomas 1938: 374, 402 and articles in ZAW, ETL, JTS, VT and VTSup. from
1934 to 1944.
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where the massive prophetic work of Ezekiel was produced) it seems odd that
a work which so fully develops the sapiential tradition of the Hebrew sages
should appear in Aramaic.
Given the currency of Aramaic as the administrative lingua franca of
Palestine and the western provinces of the Persian Empire when the Book of
Job was produced and the extent to which it had penetrated popular Hebrew,
Aramaic elements in vocabulary and grammar are but to be expected in
Palestine and in Egypt, as is indicated by the records of the Jewish or perhaps
North Israelite community of Elephantine (Cowley 1923) and elsewhere in
Egypt on the evidence of epigraphic matter (Gibson 1975: 113-47).
N.H. Snaith has supplemented the deciencies of Guillaumes work in
citing the same list of Aramaisms from DriverGray and Kautzsch9 and in
giving a more just notice of their use in Aramaic and Syriac, in Akkadian and
often in Ugaritic (Snaith 1968: 104-12). Here we may note that many an
Akkadian root has a direct descendant in Aramaic and Syriac. The case for an
assumed Aramaism in Job being a genuine Hebrew word, the rarity of which
in Hebrew literature is simply accidental, is much stronger when a Ugaritic
cognate is validly adduced. Thus Snaith rightly adduces evidence of Ugaritic
cognates to Kautzschs Aramaisms. Thus, for instance, ma (to be low,
humiliated, Job 24.24), which has Aramaic and Arabic cognates and is
attested in a Hebrew context in Eccl. 10.18 and probably earlier in Ps. 102.43,
occurs in Ugarit in the physical sense to collapse (Gordon UT V.68.2, 17).
aq (to be advanced in years, lit. to pass on, Job 21.7) occurs in Ugaritic
(Gordon UT 49 II.5, 26; 125.16, 19; 126 VI.1, 13) in the physical sense to
pass on; compare Job 9.5; 14.18; 18.4, where the verb is possibly Hebrew
rather than Aramaic. qibbl (to receive, Job 2.10) is regular in Aramaic but
exceptional in Hebrew, occurring only in late Hebrew works, for example,
Esther (4.4; 9.27), Chronicles (1 Chron. 12.19; 21.12; 2 Chron. 29.16, 22),
Ezra (8.31) and Ben Sira (12.5). Here despite its incidence in Ugaritic in the
fourteenth century BCE we are entitled to accept it in Job as an Aramaism.
Despite the afnities with Hebrew we must remember that Ugaritic was a
northern Canaanite dialect,10 so that a word like qibbl in this sense evidently
9. Kautzsch 1902: 101; Gray and Driver 1921: xlvi-xlvii. For Guillaume it is sufcient
that a word has a possible Arabic cognate to rule out the possibility of Aramaism. N.H.
Snaith (1968) also follows this line, though adducing certain instances where the assumed
Aramaisms have Ugaritic cognates. It is signicant that Pope, whose Ugaritic equipment is
much superior to Snaiths, while no more convinced than the writer by Tur-Sinais main
thesis, treats his demonstration of the Aramaic element in Job with much more respect than
Snaith (Pope 1965: livf.).
10. This was emphasized by J. Cantineau (1932; 1940: 59-61), J. Aistleitner (1937:
38f.), J. Friedrich (1933: 27; 1951), and A. Goetze (1936: 142), who regard Ugaritic as a
new language hitherto unattested which lay between Biblical Hebrew and Akkadian,
characterized by H. Bauer as Saphonisches (1935), by Goetze as Amorite and by
Aistleitner as altmesopotamisches Westsemitisch, which recognized the Amorite, or
North-West Semitic features characteristic of the dialect of Mari in the early second
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survived in Aramaic in the region, but not in Classical Hebrew before the fth
century BCE. In Job 22.28 Snaith rightly claims that the verb gzar in the basic
sense to cut is attested in Ugaritic as well as Arabic, from which the sense it
has in Job and Est. 2.1, to decree, is derived. The word has this sense in the
Mishnah, Talmud and modern Hebrew, but here it is probably inuenced by
the usage in those late Hebrew passages. The fact remains that it is in Aramaic
that it has the regular sense to decree, and its incidence in the late Hebrew
passages surely indicates Aramaism. The same may be said for emh
(beware!), which should probably be read in Job 36.18 for MT mh. It is
true that this has cognates in Arabic ama(y) (to protect) and Ugaritic myt
in the phrase gr myt (an alien in sanctuary, Gordon UT 2.27f.); compare
Akkadian amatu (sanctuary, protection). This is obviously the root of
Hebrew mh (wall) so that it is only a matter of chance that the verb is
unattested in Hebrew except possibly in Job 36.18. Here again the exceptional
incidence in the late Hebrew work and the relative frequency of amh and
am in Aramaic must indicate Aramaism in the passage. In a case like
maalm h (obscuring [Gods] purpose, Job 42.3) the rst radical consonant of the verb may suggest the Aramaic variation of Hebrew . Here,
however, Ugaritic lm (darkness, UT Krt 10; 125, 50) may indicate a Classical Hebrew root lam (to be dark), which Dahood would recognize in Eccl.
3.11 (Dahood 1952: 38). The verb lam, however, is well attested in preexilic Hebrew works in the sense of to hide, which is not unconnected with
the sense to be dark or Ugaritic lm, which is the sense of the verb in Job
42.3 and possibly in Eccl. 3.11. Since we are unable to attest the root in the
sense to be dark in Aramaic or Syriac, the passages in Job 42.3 and Eccl.
3.11 may indicate Aramaic inuence on the pronunciation of Hebrew rather
than an Aramaic root.
In his study Hebrew Poetic Diction, G.R. Driver cautions us against
concluding from Aramaic roots in a Hebrew work which are known only
through Aramaic sources that that of itself is evidence for the late date of the
work. Contending that Aramaic is by far the largest single extraneous element
in the Hebrew language (Driver 1953a), he has noted strong Aramaic inuence
in the Elohistic narrative source of the Pentateuch and Hosea in northern
Israel, with which we may compare Aramaic forms which characterize certain
narratives of Elisha in Kings, for example 2 Kgs 4.1-7, 8-37; 5.8-23; 6.24;
7.20, also from northern Israel (Burney 1903: 420ff., 440ff.).
Gordis repeats this caution (1965: 162), classifying Aramaic elements in the
OT in four categories. He admits rst an Aramaic element, which is reasonable in view of the provenance of the patriarchs from northern Mesopotamia.
millennium BCE and the Canaanite glosses in the Amarna Tablets. Greater emphasis was
placed on the Canaanite element by J.A. Montgomery and Z.S. Harris (1935: 10ff.), R. de
Langhe (1938), C.H.W. Brekelmans (1962: 6ff.) and particularly C.H. Gordon (1965: 147f.)
and M. Dahood (1952; 1962; 1963c; 1964b; besides current articles in Biblica and CBQ).
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Secondly he reckons with borrowing from Aramaic in the pre-exilic period,

especially from Syria during the days of the kingdom of Damascus, with
which Israel had relations friendly and more often unfriendly until the eighth
century BCE. In the Northern Kingdom with its interest in the northern part of
Transjordan, a border land itself, it is natural to expect afnity of language
with Aramaic which was spoken just over the border, just as in the English
marches of Northumberland and Cumberland we nd closer afnity in
vocabulary and pronunciation with the dialect of the Scottish borders than the
English of Oxford or London. Thirdly, in and after the exile, when communities of Jews were isolated in Aramaean communities in Mesopotamia and
particularly when Aramaic became the ofcial administrative language in the
western provinces of the Persian Empire from the middle of the sixth century
BCE, Hebrew was particularly exposed to Aramaic inuence. This is the period
in which, on grounds other than language, the Book of Job is usually dated.
Finally the current Aramaic is attested increasingly in the targums, Mishnah
and the Talmud in the early Christian era.
The same case is developed at greater length and depth by Max Wagner in
his important monograph,11 where he examines possible Aramaisms in
vocabulary, roots and forms, meanings and phonetic variations in the various
books in the OT. He reaches the conclusion that Aramaic contributed at all
times to the vocabulary and grammatical forms in Hebrew either by the
inuence of Old Aramaic in local dialects in Palestine or, in the case of late
books like Job, through the currency of Aramaic from the sixth century BCE to
the Masoretic standardization of the text of the OT, which in fact it may to a
great extent have determined.12
In Wagners tabulated summary of his survey and conclusions on vocabulary (Wagner 1966: 139-43) we nd that though there are Aramaisms of one or
other of those classes in every book of the OT (except possibly Nahum) they
are particularly frequent in exilic or postexilic books, especially Esther,13 Song
of Songs, Ecclesiastes, the Hebrew section of Daniel and, to a lesser extent
than those, Job, especially in the Elihu section.14 From the considerable
evidence of Aramaisms of various categories in the earlier books of the OT we
should not be prepared to take automatically all Aramaic words and forms as
reecting the Aramaic of the exilic or postexilic period. Nevertheless their
11. Wagner 1966. Wagner cordially endorses Drivers views of the inuence of
Aramaic on Hebrew throughout the OT, which had already been expressed by D. Winton
Thomas in Record and Revelation (1938: 386-91). Wagner species more particularly what
constitutes an Aramaism.
12. So Meyer 1957: 139ff.; 1958: 45ff.; Baumgartner 1959: 209.
13. Wagner includes Persian loanwords through Aramaic.
14. Wagner gives the percentage of Aramaisms in the whole vocabulary of Job
excluding the Prologue and Epilogue and the Elihu sections as 1.6%, of the Elihu sections
as 2%, of Song of Songs as 2.2%, of Ecclesiastes as 3.1%, of Daniel 1.75%, and of Esther
as 5.3% (excluding Persian loanwords through Aramaic 4%).
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exceptional frequency in Job in contrast to pre-exilic works and in comparison

to postexilic books makes it probable that they do reect the currency of
Aramaic at that time, when Wagner demonstrates that even on the most
generous estimate of Aramaisms in the earlier sources, this element increased
six-fold (1966: 149f.). Granted that the number of Aramaisms Wagner nds in
Job may require to be reduced in the light of Ugaritic elements with afnity
with the Canaanite rather than the Aramaic substratum of Hebrew, there is
still a comparatively substantial element of Aramaism in Job, though, in
comparison with the Song of Songs, Ecclesiastes and Esther, not enough to
suggest that the book was a translation of an Aramaic original. In conclusion,
we may note that that nota accusativa et, which is regular in Classical
Hebrew, is limited to the prose narrative in the Prologue and Epilogue and
certain introductions to the various addresses in the Dialogue, but occurs only
thrice in the Dialogue where the MT is questioned in the versions (5.17; 14.3
and 26.4). Elsewhere in the poetic Dialogue, where the nota accusativa is used
sparingly, it is always the Aramaic le. We would note also the Aramaic masculine plural termination -n which appears invariably in milln (words). This
noun, incidentally, though occurring in earlier Hebrew works (2 Sam. 23.2),
Prov. 23.9 (monarchic) and in the undateable Ps. 139.3, 4, is found in the late
postexilic Ps. 19.5 and recurs over 30 times throughout Job from 4.2 to 38.2.
The survival of Aramaic elements in Classical Hebrew is understandable in
view of the Mesopotamian antecedents of the aramm , the forwandered
Aramaean, and later contacts between northern Israel and northern Transjordan with the Aramaean populations of Syria and the borderlands. What then
of the Canaanite substratum of Hebrew evidenced by Ugaritic?
In the Late Bronze Age when Egypt claimed suzerainty over Palestine and
southern Syria (Canaan) we are familiar with citations and glosses in the
Amarna Tablets which have afnity with Hebrew and more particularly with
Ugaritic. The repeated deportations of the populations of Palestine and southern Syria to which Egyptian records of that time refer, must have resulted in a
large Canaanite population in Egypt, particularly in the north, which was a
ready material for exploitation in forced labour, of which the Exodus tradition
has preserved vivid reminiscence (Exod. 1.9-14). There is no reason to believe
that the mixed multitude that traditionally Moses led out of Egypt (Exod.
12.38) was limited to the family of Jacob, the Aramaean forbears of Israel.
The majority of those who survived detention in Egypt were probably those
deported to Egypt and their descendants. Nor do we nd it likely that Palestine
was occupied in the Early Iron Age by a conquering minority of Aramaean
stock. We have no doubt that Moses or some such gure with a natural gift of
leadership and spiritual charisma was able to weld a mixed multitude into a
religious community which penetrated into Palestine. In an analysis of the
names, local settlement and characteristics of the conventional tribes of
Israel in Palestine and Transjordan we have contended for the accretion from
the nucleus of such a sacral community to a larger sacral confederacy through
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attraction of second-class citizens disaffected under the petty kings and

oligarchies of the small city-states of the land (J. Gray 1988: 439-55) in
agreement with the thesis of G. Mendenhall (1962). This symbiosis was put on
a rm political basis by David with the emergence of the historic Israel. The
linguistic result was the Hebrew of the early narrative sources of the Pentateuch and certain of the Psalms and subsequent literature in the language of
Canaan.
We are now prepared to assess the language of the Book of Job on the
evidence of the fullest extant representative of Canaanitish, Ugaritic, bearing
always in mind that it represents the most northerly of the Canaanite dialects,
with afnity with Akkadian and Aramaic dialects in northern Syria and
Mesopotamia,15 though the afnity of Ugaritic with other Canaanite dialects in
the southern Syria and Palestine including their development in Hebrew was
stronger.
The Ras Shamra texts, particularly the poetic myths and legends, attest
many words which not only formally suggest a cognate with Hebrew, but,
being in parallelism with others often in the same combination as in Hebrew,16
give indication of a more precise nuance in the latter than is often the case
with cognates cited from other Semitic languages. This in itself is very
impressive evidence of the value of Ugaritic for understanding Hebrew texts
and in the solution of many problems that abound in such a book as Job. But it
is when we study the grammar of the Ras Shamra texts that its pre-eminence
for the appreciation of the language of such a book, whether in support or
emendation of the MT, is really manifest.
To begin with the verb, we encounter here the optative perfect, for example
in UT 76 II.20: wt at (May you live, sc. ourish, O sister). This is found
also in Arabic, but on the strength of its incidence in Ugaritic, taken with the
mass of evidence that may be cited for the afnity of Hebrew and Ugaritic, its
closest neighbour, we may condently see Canaanite inuence rather than
Arabic in Jobs exclamation on the fateful night of his parents marriage (3.3):
hrh ger (May a man-child be conceived!). The imperfect is used in
graphic narrative, though this may express rapid succession of actions in the
past like the Akkadian preterite. Like Hebrew and Arabic the jussive and
imperfect indicative has often an energic ending, which we must be prepared
to nd more often in Hebrew than has been recognized. Thus in Bildads
second address he opens with the statement: a-nh emenn q elmilln17 (How long until you put an end to speaking?, 18.2). Here the recognition of the energic imperfect suggests the emendation of the verb in MT,
where the plural is contrary to Bildads address to Job. The nal n of the
restoration of the text has been corrupted to w in the Old Hebrew script.
15. See above p. 77.
16. Gevirtz 1963; Craigie 1971; 1977; 1979a; 1979b. Watson 1988.
17. MT emended after LXX and 11QtargJob. See above p. 92.
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The imperfect is also used in Ugaritic to express purpose after the imperative in anacoleuthon, for example in Gordon Krt 37:
rd lmlk amlk
ldrktk abnn
Come down from the kingship that I may be king,
From your administration that I may occupy the throne.
Compare Job 34.28:

leb lyw aaqa-dl
weaaqa aniyym yim
To bring before him the cry of the poor,
That he may hear the cry of the distressed.
This Ugaritic text also illustrates the energic imperfect and the root drk
expressing rule or ordered government; compare Arabic darkatu(n) with the
same sense, which we shall have occasion to note in Job as distinct from the
usual sense of dere (way) in passages expressing the ordered government of
the divine king.
The verb in Ugaritic is often introduced by a proclitic l with asseverative
force, for example in Gordon UT 51 V.65-66:
rbt il lkmt
bt dqnk ltrk
Thou art aged, O El, thou art indeed wise,
Surely the grey hairs of your beard instruct thee.
In this passage, almost pure Hebrew, we may note rb in the sense not of
great, as usually in Hebrew, but, as the parallel indicates, aged, as in Job
32.9:
l-rabbm yekm
zeqnm yn mip
It is not (just) the aged who are wise,
And the old who are discriminate in judgment.
However, it is the asseverative sense of the proclitic l in the Ugaritic text

that is really signicant. This we nd to have been repeatedly misunderstood
by Hebrew scribes who pointed it in many a passage as the negative l
possibly because it was pronounced lo in Ugaritic, as Gordon suggested. In the
MT the effect was to give such passages the diametric opposite of the sense the
context demands. One out of many such instances, perhaps the most striking,
is in Jobs apologia pro vita sua in 29.24:
eaq alhem le (MT l) ya amn
weru (MT wer) pnay loyalq (MT l yappln)
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If I smiled to them then indeed they gained condence,

And if my face shone they fairly beamed.
Confronted by the difculty of the negative l in the MT Mowinckel and

Fohrer cut the Gordian knot by omitting it as a scribal error, while G.R. Driver
understood it as interrogative for the more normal hal, the rhetorical question
as a strong asseverative. But other instances of MT l which give the converse
of the sense of the context do not support this explanation, for example Jobs
objection to his inquisitor in 14.16:
k-atth eay tispr
letimr al-a (reading le for MT l)
But as it is thou dost keep account of my steps,
And dost surely mark my transgression.
Here incidentally the parallel eday indicates that a is, as Eitan

proposed (1924: 38-42), probably cognate of Arabic awatu(n) (a step),
which the Masoretes pointed as the more familiar Hebrew haa. By happy
coincidence we may recognize both senses of the noun by the English
translation transgression.
Another usage to emerge in Ugaritic is the signicance of al introducing
the imperfect. It is already familiar in Hebrew as the negative particle introducing the jussive and occasionally has this force in Ugaritic. In Ugaritic,
however, it may also introduce the imperfect indicative, for example in
Gordon UT 51.VIII.1:
idk al ttn phm m r
Then indeed did they direct themselves to the mountain.
The Masoretes evidently recognized this usage in Ps. 121.3:

al-yittn lamm ralek
al-ynm merek
He will not suffer your foot to stumble,
Your keeper will not sleep.
This solves an outstanding difculty in Job 13.20, where the sufferer makes
his request:
a-ettayim al-taa imm
Grant me but two requests.
The Ras Shamra texts familiarize us with the conjunction or proclitic k

introducing the verb in the nal position in a sentence, which is thus emphasized, for example in Gordon UT Aqhat V.15:
gm linth kyh
Aloud he cries to his wife.
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This is also found in Hebrew though possibly not recognized by the Masoretes
or even earlier scribes, for example in the refrain in Ps. 118.10-12:
bem yhwh k amlm
in the name of Yahweh I will drive them away.
It may even introduce and so emphasize a nal sentence, for example in Deut.
32.9:
k leq yhwh amm
yaaq eel naal
Yahwehs portion was his people,
Jacob the lot which he inherited.
Another phenomenon with the verb in Ugaritic is the nal enclitic m, for
example apparently with the participle or innitive absolute in Gordon UT
V.10:
my bilm ydy mr
grm zbln
Who among the gods will drive out the sickness,
Expelling the disease?.
In such cases m may have an adverbial sense. A nal m with a verb has caused
commentators on the OT some perplexity, which might, of course, be resolved
by assuming scribal corruption of a nal n or, in the case of the masculine
plural, w to m in the Old Hebrew script. Now emendation is obviated in the
light of Ugaritic usage, for example in Job 12.27:
yemae-e (MT we) l-r
(MT wayyam) kaikkr.
Here in colon b the LXX read the Niphal wayyitt, assuming the same subject
as for the verb in colon a, and it must be admitted that the nal m in the MT
wayyam must have been taken as w in the Vorlage of the LXX. But the
Masoretes must have found nal m in the text they transmitted, which was
probably in scriptio defectiva. They then took the nal m as the pronominal
sufx, pointing accordingly, so changing the subject, converting the Niphal of
the verb into the Hiphil.
Final m appears also in Ugaritic as a substitute for a preposition, for
example in Gordon UT Krt 265-66:
nh kspm atn
wl rm
Two (thirds) of her I will give in silver,
Yea, a third in gold.
Or nal m may be used as a supplement to the preposition, for example km

(as), bm (in, with, at, on, from), lm (to, for, from), which evidently
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survived in Hebrew kem, bem, lem. Final m attached to a noun, as in gm

(aloud, lit. with a voice), or to a verb, either participle or innitive absolute
as in grm (driving away), may have an adverbial sense. This usage has
survived in Hebrew in the adverbs innm (in vain), pim (suddenly),
omnm (truly), rqm (empty-handed) and ymm (by day) (de Langhe
1946).
Certain prepositions in Ugaritic have meanings beyond the usual sense of
their Hebrew equivalents. Thus b, as well as meaning at, by, with, in, on as
in Hebrew, may mean from, for example Gordon UT 1 Aqht. 75, 113:
bph rgm lya
bpth hwt
Word passed from her lips,
Declaration from her lips.
Incidentally, this attests a word hwh (Akkadian awatu) which must be

recognized in Job 6.30: im-ikk l-yn hawwt (Can my palate not
discriminate words?). The sense of from is illustrated in Job 12.10:
aer bey nee kol-y
wera kol-bear-s.
Here s in the sense of man, assumed in the pointing of the MT, is unapt. The
chiastic parallelism demands something corresponding to bey. So MT s is
probably a corruption in the square script attested at Qumran of an original
(gift), cognate with Arabic awu(n) and Ugaritic un and the verbal element
in the theophoric name Jehoash. This being so bey means not in his hand
but from his hand. The passage incidentally illustrates another distinctive
feature of Ugaritic poetry which survived in Hebrew, the pronominal sufx
doing double duty in a couplet. The passage in Job may then be rendered:
From whose hand are all who live,
And whose gift is all esh?
Another case of be meaning from as well as le with this sense is Job

20.20b-21a:
beome (MT baam) l yemml
n-r leoel
No one escapes from his greed,
There is no survivor from what he devours.
We nd another case of be meaning from in Job 19.19:

taan kol-me s
wezeh-hat nehpe-
All the men of my society have shown their abhorrence of me,
And those I moved have turned from me.
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This passage illustrates another correspondence with Ugaritic, zeh corresponding to Ugaritic d, which is the regular relative pronoun in Aramaic. This
may be a feature of Ugaritic as a northern Canaanite dialect with afnities with
the Semitic dialects of northern Syria and Mesopotamia, which emerge to our
notice as Aramaic. That the sense of le (from) was once more familiar in
Hebrew is indicated by the compound preposition mille and lemin.
In the OT the preposition al means normally against, like im, or upon,
but is found where the meaning to is expected, for example in Job 31.5:
im-hlat im-w
wattaa al-mirmh ragl
If I have gone to evil,
And my foot has hastened to treachery.
Compare Gordon UT 127.39:

l abh yrb
To his father he enters.
It is signicant, however, that this is not a regular usage in Ugaritic, but is

used exceptionally in this passage in the Krt Legend of being admitted to the
presence of a dignitary, here the king, who would of course be seated while
the one who entered stood above him. Despite the evidence of al in this
sense from Ugarit, its recurrence in Aramaic passages in Dan. 2.24; 4.31, 33,
6.7, 18; Ezra 4.12, 23 and so on indicates that in such a passage in Job as the
one we have cited this may be an Aramaism.
The preposition m as well as meaning to as in Aramaic and Syriac but not
in Hebrew, and with, which is regular in Hebrew, evidently was at one time
patient of the meaning from, to judge from the compound preposition in
Hebrew mim. We are not able to attest this meaning in Ugaritic, but the
compound preposition may indicate this sense of im in a southern Canaanite
dialect from which Hebrew developed. However this may be, this seems to be
the sense of im in Job 27.13 in the MT:
zeh leq (-m) r im-l
wenaala rm miadday yiqq
This is the portion of the wicked man from God,
And the lot of the violent which he will receive from the Almighty.
Here the parallel with arm may indicate the plural rem in colon a, and
the collocation of and m might suggest the more familiar preposition mim,
with haplography of m.
Impressive as we nd these correspondences between Ugaritic and Hebrew
poetry in vocabulary and grammar, the instances we have cited are a mere
fraction of what must be cited in any commentary on Job, as the publications
of the late M. Dahood, including one specially on Job, have shown, even if
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one must occasionally qualify his conclusions.18 In the passages we have cited,
beyond the features we have especially mentioned, the close correspondence
with Hebrew, especially Hebrew poetry, will have been noticed, indicating a
correspondence far exceeding that of any other cognate language, which is
mainly conned to vocabulary. The correspondence of Hebrew with Ugaritic
extends much further, to style in the parallelism of members symmetric,
antithetic, cumulative and chiastic and to the plethora of imagery common to
both and the wealth of mythology in Israelite literature which is invested with
a new meaning in the new medium, the signicance of which is to be fully
understood in the light of its Sitz im Leben in Ugarit.
However we may appreciate the Canaanite substratum of Hebrew and the
extent to which the author of Job drew upon the poetic tradition of Canaan, we
must recognize that Hebrew language was no arrested development. Thought
and expression in Israel developed and matured with political development
and contact with the outside world, Egypt in the time of Solomon and the
Aramaeans of Syria. With those widening horizons in Solomons reign, and
under his patronage, professional administrators and their instructors came
into contact with the sapiential works and traditions of Egypt and probably
Mesopotamia and found their own expression of Wisdom so stimulated. New
expressions were occasioned by the spiritual development promoted by the
liturgy of the Temple and evidenced by the Psalms and by the great prophets.
The Book of Job is poetry of the highest quality, which drew generously upon
the resources of Canaanite poetry and used a wealth of language often beyond
the scope of current Hebrew, at least so far as it is attested, the meaning of
which we may gather from cognates in kindred Semitic languages, subject
always to the test of congruency with the context and the parallelism of
members in Job. However, the more we know of Hebrew literature the more
we are impressed with the uency of the author of Job in Hebrew language as
it had developed through the history of Israel, his natural application of its
idiom, thought and literary forms. With consummate ease and mastery he
adapted the literary forms and their associated themes and expressions. This he
does sometimes in support of the orthodox theology of Jobs friends in the
Hymn of Praise and the proverbial wisdom they cite and represent or in the
declarations on the fate of the wicked from Wisdom psalms. He may on the
other hand adapt this material in his criticism of current orthodoxy. He even
daringly parodies Psalm 8 (at 7.17-18), while the thought, vocabulary and
imagery of the Plaint of the Sufferer in the Psalms echo throughout the book,
with verbal and thematic echoes of Jer. 20.14-18 and Lam. 3.8-9 in 3.3-10 and
19.5-8 respectively. Jobs apologia pro vita sua in ch. 29 reects the Israelite
ideal of social responsibility expressed in the psalms and prophets, while his
18. Cf. the just yet critical appraisal of Dahoods use of Ugaritic material in his AB
commentary on Psalms by P.C. Craigie in the latters excellent commentary on Psalms 1
50 (1983).
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Oath of Purgation reects such a declaration of integrity as is expressed in

Psalm 15, a liturgy of access to worship in the Temple, and more particularly
in substance, the social demands of the Decalogue, and in form, the Twelve
Adjurations in Deut. 27.10-26. From such correspondences then we have little
doubt that in language, thought and form, the Book of Job is in the mainstream
of traditional Hebrew which had developed until the fth century BCE, with
other linguistic elements, like Aramaic, strictly secondary.
Chapter 9
THE ARGUMENT
In the Prologue the authors adaptation of his source poses the problem of the
reaction of a person to what Hebrew thought ascribes to a benecent and just
God in the vicissitudes of life. The tradition of Israel in cult, prophecy and
Wisdom encouraged humans to expect that in conformity to the revealed
nature and will of God they might expect material expression of his favour as
they might expect deance of the divine will for society to result in condign
punishment. This expression of divine justice, or theodicy, is notably inculcated in the Book of Proverbs with its many graphic illustrations of the principle in salutary admonition to prospective leaders of society. As a result, the
overall impression is that of a utilitarian morality, which must lead one to
question the motivation of the approved conduct of a man perfect and upright,
fearing God and shunning evil (1.8). This is done by the agency of the n
in the Prologue, and the stage is set to assess Gods faith in humanity as the
apex of his creation, his servant, one devoted to and governed by the divine
will and the recipient of his favour, by the acid test of faith in adversity. From
this trial the sufferer emerges with faith unimpaired in what the author has
retained of his source in Jobs classical response (1.21):
Naked I came out of my mothers womb
And naked shall I go away again whither I shall go;
Yahweh gave and Yahweh has taken,
Blessed be the name of Yahweh.
In this declaration Gods faith in humanity is gloriously justied in his fortitude in adversity, which the Wisdom tradition of Israel inculcated, and which
is one of the cardinal elements in the Arab ideal of manhood (muratu[n]).
With the dialogue and its prelude in Jobs curse on the day of his birth the
authors proper contribution begins. Despite the sturdy faith of the sufferer in
Jobs declaration in 1.21 and 2.10 the reader may well be disturbed by the
suffering of the exemplary Job by the permissive will of God, which, to be
sure, seriously modies the teaching of the sages in Proverbs. This is shared
by the author in his controversial adaptation of his source, reected in Jobs
curse on the day of his birth (ch. 3). Though in the Prologue he has rmly
rejected his wifes advice to curse God and die (2.9), Job, though not cursing
his creator, curses his creation in his curse of the day he was born (3.3ff.). The
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very purpose of life is questioned in the light of his unmitigated suffering

(3.20, 23):
Why is life given to one in trouble
To a man whose way is hidden
We have little doubt that this is more than a general academic question, but
regard it as reecting the personal agony of the author in contrast to the
dismissal of life and its experiences and aims as vanity by the gentle cynic.
This intimate personal involvement characterizes Jobs arguments in response
to his friends throughout the Dialogue with progressive intensity, where the
arguments of traditional Wisdom on the mutual relationship of God and
humanity are subjected to the authors keen and controversial criticism.
In the opening of the Dialogue Jobs impassioned personal reaction in
questioning the meaning of the life of a person like himself tormented by
unrelieved suffering is rebuked by Eliphaz (4.3-6; 5.2) as the betrayal of the
unimpassioned reaction of a human to the vicissitudes of life commended by
Hebrew Wisdom:
You would strengthen bowing knees;
But now when it reaches you, you cannot bear it,
And when it comes to you, you are non-plussed
For resentment kills the fool,
And passion is the death of the simpleton.
Signicantly, in his questioning of the meaning of life in face of his

suffering (ch. 3), Job has not introduced the subject of his innocence. Ones
sufferings are indeed related to the will of God, who circumscribes ones
freedom (3.23), though the controversial note has been sounded by Jobs wife:
Are you still unshaken in your integrity?
Curse God and die!
In Jobs curse on the day he was born, with his harrowing plaint of his sufferings, there is no question of their relation to his conduct. This is introduced by
Eliphaz, insisting on the doctrine of the theodicy represented in traditional
Hebrew theology, as in the Deuteronomistic history, prophecy and proverbs.
This is the reply of Wisdom to Jobs bleak pessimism in ch. 3.
The kindliest and most mature of Jobs three friends and probably the one
who shares his spiritual problem, Elihu, edges the argument ad hominem. He
advances from his rebuke of Jobs impassioned expostulation in ch. 3 to Gods
animadversion on his failure as a sage and pious man to appreciate Gods
Order in his upholding of the innocent and the discomture of the wicked
(4.7f.):
What man if innocent ever perished,
Or where were the righteous cut off?
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9. The Argument
For as far as I have seen, those who plough in mischief
And sow trouble reap it.
Implying rather than explicitly asserting the culpability of the sufferer,

Eliphaz proceeds to argue a maiore ad minus that as the celestials are
imperfect with relation to God, a mortal is even more morally defective (4.1719):
Is a man just vis--vis God?
Is a man pious vis--vis his maker?
If he does not commit himself wholly to his servants,
And charges even his angels with error,
Much more those that inhabit houses of clay,
Whose foundations are in the dust.
Eliphaz uses the same argument with more pointed allegation of the culpability of the sufferer in 15.14-16, and, with probably more than a mere hint at
Jobs culpability, he states (5.6f.):
Mischief does not grow out of the soil,
Nor trouble spring from the earth.
Trouble is innate in a man
As soaring ight in Reshefs brood.1
The sufferer is more overtly indicted by Zophar in the rst cycle or the
Dialogue (11.6), and from this point, provoked by Jobs pointed criticisms of
the friends arguments for the theodicy as applied to his particular case, their
indictment intensies until Eliphazs specic charges in 22.4-11, which,
however, we prefer to regard as in the design of the author to introduce specic charges to answer in anticipation of Jobs apologia (ch. 29) and oath of
purgation (ch. 31).
Meanwhile Eliphaz commends Job to Gods mercy in anticipation of relief
from his suffering enhanced by material favour (5.8, 17-26), and this is,
signicantly, at this stage of the Dialogue the approach of Bildad (8.5-7) and
even the acrimonious Zophar (11.13-19), in whose statement, in anticipation
of the indictment pressed against Job, the relationship between sin and
suffering is more directly implied (11.4-6). However, while the plea to God
which Eliphaz recommends might be understood as one for relief from
unmerited suffering, the drift of the friends argument indicates rather that it is
the plea of the penitent sinner and not the man of whom God approved without
qualication in the Prologue.
Apart from the arguments of the friends for the suffering of humans in
the divine economy as retributive, which they support by all too familiar
experience (5.3-7, 13-16; 8.8-22; 15.20-35; 20.5-29) and by graphic aphorism
(18.5-21), Eliphaz proposes the explanation of suffering as discipline which
betokens the favour or God, not, however, without the implication that such
1. Vultures. See Commentary ad loc.
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111
chastisement is for some degree of sin. This view is propounded in the Elihu
addendum, which suggests that such discipline as well as being therapeutic to
a sinner may also be preventative (33.14-30).
In reply to Eliphazs mild rebuke to his impassioned outburst on the curse
of the day of his birth Jobs despair is not assuaged by Eliphazs generalities
regarding the limitations of humans and their natural propensity to trouble
(active or passive). He is not encouraged by Eliphazs observations of the
effective justice of God in the retribution of the wicked and his blessing on the
righteous and the repentant sinner. Indeed, Eliphazs recommendation of an
appeal for Gods mercy (5.8), coupled with his declaration that trouble is
innate in humans, surely implies the belief in a necessary connection between
sin and suffering, which dominates the argument of Jobs friends throughout
the Dialogue. Many obvious instances of such a connection may be adduced,
though the realist may cite all too obvious modications in the case of blatant
materialists (21.7-15).
Granted, however, the general experience that sin in more and less degree
results physically, mentally and spiritually in suffering, we may not infer that
in every case suffering is the consequence of sin. This logical fallacy impairs
the argument of Jobs friends from rst to last in the Dialogue. Nor indeed can
Job, despite his clear conscience, divest himself of the fallacy, imputing his
suffering to Gods allegation of sin. The logical fallacy is nally exposed in
the divine rebuke that Job convicts the Almighty while exculpating himself
(40.8). Firm in the conviction that his suffering was unmerited at the hand of
God (7.12-21) the sufferer breaks out in apostrophe to God (7.12):
Am I Sea or Tannin
That you set a watch over me?
Alluding to the traditional theme of Gods effective conict with the forces
of chaos, Job animadverts on the Order established by God in creation
culminating in the creation of humanity in the image of God, capable of
response to him according to the revelation of the divine nature and will
expressed in society governed by his Order. The sufferer thus rejects Eliphazs
citation of the Divine Order in nature and society (5.5-16) in his encouragement to convince Job that humans are not the victims of blind chance of an
arbitrary divine power but, under the divine economy, may look for relief and
favour beyond their present suffering, just as sinners may expect retribution
(5.11-27).
The signicance of this expression of faith may be grasped by the
recognition of its place in the faith of Israel in Hymns of Praise to God as King
in the great autumn festival (e.g. Pss. 29; 65; 93; 97; etc.), as the ground of
assurance in the Plaint of the Sufferer both communal (e.g. Pss. 44; 74) and
individual (e.g. Pss. 22.4, 29 [EVV 3, 28]; 102.13, 16 [EVV 12, 15]; 103.20ff.
[EVV 19ff.]), and in its application in the prophets in hope (Nah. 1.3-5; Hab.
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9. The Argument
3.8-15; and particularly Deutero-Isaiah, 51.9 and 40.12-14, the latter of which
enumerates the cosmic exploits of the Divine Creator in a series of questions
reecting the sapiential tradition, as in the Divine Declaration on the same
theme in Job 38.1-39; 40.25-30 [EVV 41.1-6]). So in the recurrence of the
theme in the statements of Jobs friends and its corollary in the assertion of
Gods Order in society (e.g. 8; 15.20ff.; 18.5ff.) we have matter which might
lift the sufferer beyond his nihilistic despair, his obsession with his unmerited
suffering and his doubt of the interest and of the justice of God. Or again the
application of the theme in prophecies of doom (e.g. Jer. 10.12-16; Isa. 26.22;
27.1) is made by Jobs friends in their reply to his intensied challenge to the
traditional doctrine they represent. But this the author counters in Jobs parody
of Ps. 8.4f. in Job 7.17 and his sarcastic criticism (12.10-23), with emphasis on
the destructive activity of God in his otherwise ordered creation in nature and
society (9.4-24), with particular reference to the case of the worthy sufferer
(9.11ff.), whom God condemns to torture without a fair hearing (9.14-20, 3235). So in his response to the encouragement or censure of his friends the
sufferer either relapses into the nihilistic prospect of ch. 3, recurring in 7.1-10,
14-21; 10.18-22; 14; 17.11-16, or aspires, too often in vain, to a hearing in
confrontation with God, when he may state his case, condent in his innocence, thus challenging the justice of the Almighty, the traditional belief
which, however, he cannot quite renounce despite all apparent evidence to the
contrary which his sufferings suggest (13.14-22; 16.18-21). In such a confrontation Job might expect God to state his grounds of complaint which
occasion Jobs suffering (10.22; 13.23f.):
I will say to you, Do not condemn me,
Inform me of your case against me
Then call, and I will answer,
Or let me make a statement, and you answer.
Besides natural disasters cited by Job (10.5-7; 12.14-22), which impair

Gods Order that Jobs friends allege, the sufferings of the worthy man, such
as disease and at the hands of oppressors or traducers, recur in Jobs lamentations (7.5-10; 16.8-16; 19.15-20) in the language and imagery familiar in the
Plaint of the Sufferer in the Psalms. There, however, in the context of the cult
they are incidental to the rehabilitation of the sufferer in Gods Order either in
anticipation or in thanksgiving. The author of the book of Job, true to sapiential tradition, faces lifes problems independently of the cult, and the sufferings
of the worthy man are presented in all their stark simplicity, indeed in the
context of a Jobs apologia pro vita sua (chs. 2930) the disruption of Gods
Order without qualication is clearly implied in the fatal impairing of the
social potential of the worthy and willing man. In this context then ch. 29 is
not a plaint in anticipation of deliverance nor a statement of sufferings from
which deliverance is already experienced, but is the statement of a plaintiff
with a just cause which he sustains by an oath of purgation (ch. 31).
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As humanists, Jobs sage friends support the doctrine of the theodicy, reechoing the summary dismissal of the wicked who seem to disrupt Gods
Order in Proverbs. Thus they allege that the wicked may ourish but, like the
grass in Ps. 37.2-10, this will be but for a time, when their end will be
complete (Job 5.3; 8.11-19; 15.20-35; 18.5-21; 20.5-29). In Jobs statements
there is no such prospect. It is true that, apart from obvious retribution, the
physical effects of over-indulgence and the anxiety of the violent malefactor in
his constant apprehension of retaliation (18.11ff.) may be cited in support of
the arguments of Jobs friends. However, the miscreant too often dees justice
until his death, going down to an honoured burial (21.31-34). In his reply to
the condent assertion of the certain end of the wicked in the aphorisms cited
by Bildad, the author seriously questions their universal validity (21.17f.).
Nor, in his explosion of the current doctrine of the theodicy, does the author
admit that the sin of the wicked who die with impunity may be entailed with
condign retribution on his descendants (e.g. Exod. 21.5), a communal ethic
already modied in Israel by the time of the book of Job (Deut. 24.6; Ezek.
19.18; Job 21.19). Thus the realist rejects the arguments of his orthodox friends
and invites, indeed compels, serious consideration of lifes experiences.
The author of the Book of Job puts the problem of suffering beyond the
scope of theory and objective discussion in relating his unmitigated sufferings
to God (3; 6.4-9; 9.11-24; 19.6-12; 21), his problem being more acute in that
his sufferings are out of all proportion to his exemplary life noticed in the
Prologue. Thus the poet heightens the drama of his work, but such passages,
and particularly Jobs apostrophes to the Almighty (7.12-21; 9.25-31; 10;
14.16f.), which come as interjections in the debate, surely reect the personal
agony of the author, which prompted his great work. This personal agony is
intensied in Jobs appeals to God for a hearing where he may sustain his case
of a life corresponding to what was recognized in his society as the declared
nature and will of God (13.14-17; 16.19-22; 17.3), which prompts the condent, though to be sure only momentary, hope of ultimate vindication
(19.25-27):
But I myself am sure, the one who will vindicate me is vital,
And one who is nal authority will prove himself effective on this earth,
And though my skin is stripped from my esh,
Even after that I shall come face to face with God,
Whom I myself shall see,
Whom I shall see with my own eyes, himself and no stranger.
Here the author ventures into a realm peculiarly personal and beyond the
scope of traditional Wisdom and current theology.
Jobs objections to his friends defence of the current conception of the
theodicy in its strictly mechanical application on which they insist and his
claimant appeals to defend himself before the divine tribunal elicit their
response that God is transcendent, beyond the conception and aspiration of
mortals and even the celestials (4.17-21; 11.8-10; 15.7f., 15f.; 22.12). The
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9. The Argument
transcendence of God is the ultimate solution of the problem of Job, as is

indicated in the Divine Declaration (38.139.30; 40.25-30 [EVV 41.1-6]),
which Job nally accepts (40.4-5; 42.2-6). But he does so in the light of its full
implications, which are not revealed until the theophany and Divine Declaration. However, in response to his friends appeal to the transcendence of God,
Job, far from being silenced, considers the transcendence of God an obstacle
to his faith in a God who would, according to his essential character that is just
and merciful, treat him according to his own norm of justice as the servant of
God, as his blameless conduct deserved, or bring to his notice the case which
he apparently had against the sufferer, and admit him to a fair hearing. Yet
Jobs reaction to his friends assertion of the transcendence of God as their
ultimate argument is an oscillation between hope and despair. Thus to the
prospect of God standing surety for him in the encounter which he so ardently
desires (17.3) or to his appeal to God backed by celestial support (16.19f.) and
his sanguine hope of vindication by the living God (19.25-27) we may
counterpoise his statement that even if a petitioners case could be presented
no one could win it nor indeed would God consent to answer one question in
a thousand (9.2f.), nor could a sufferer in such a case expect either response
to his just case or mercy (9.15). The alternation of sapiential dialectic and
impassioned plaint of suffering by the will of God and particularly direct
appeal to him emphasizes the theme of the book as the conict between theological formulation and existential experience, between theology and religion.
Thus it culminates in the nearest approach to the confrontation with God
which Job has wished, his direct appeal to God in his oath of purgation (ch.
31) prefaced by his apologia pro vita sua (ch. 29) and his plaint (ch. 30),
which in such a context is tantamount to a charge against God for permitting
the impairment of the social potential indicated in ch. 29, and Gods response
in the Divine Declaration. Here the author leaves the controversial eld of the
Dialogue for the nal solution of his problem, signicantly between Job himself and God, whom he has been apostrophizing throughout the debate with his
friends in the Dialogue.
In the theophany in thunder, where the poet uses the imagery of the revelation of the sovereignty of God in the Enthronement Psalms (Pss. 29; 46; cf.
Amos 1.2; Joel 3.16), and in the Divine Declaration Job nally sees God.
That is to say he is brought to an overwhelming sense of the presence and
power of God, tremendous beyond the full comprehension and scope of
human competence, yet of compelling attraction and compelling response as in
the call of Isaiah (Isa. 6.5, 9):
Woe is me! For I am lost
For my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of Hosts
And I answered, Here am I; send me.
The Divine Declaration is not the answer Job would expect. It is in fact a
rebuke, and as such it is a reply to Jobs allegation of divine injustice in his
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The Book of Job
115
suffering, which, through the logical fallacy we nave noticed, he regarded as

the consequence of sin imputed to him by God. To the logical fallacy Gods
condemnation of Jobs words without knowledge (38.2b) might specically
refer. The gist of the divine reply, however, exposes the inadequacy of the
mechanical application of the humanly formulated doctrine of the theodicy
with relation to the eternal counsel, or purpose (h) of God (38.2a). The
latter theme is elaborated in an impressive series of ironical questions which
pose the limitations of humans in contrast to the manifold evidences of the
power and wisdom of the creator, all of which attest His positive purpose.
These ironical questions culminate in the passage 40.7-14, which asserts
Gods Order in society and exposes, or at least implies, human limitations to
make that order effective, even though he might acknowledge it.
The rebuke, however, is tempered by the emphasis on the Providence of
God as evidenced by the regulation of nature to the benet of humans (38.3137) even apart from human advantage, with rain upon the uninhabited desert
(38.26f.) and his provision for the beasts of the wild (38; 39; 40.25-30 [EVV
41.16]) with their characteristics beyond humans control for their convenience. Humanity, we are thereby reminded, is not the measure of Gods universe, and if humans are chastened by being reminded of this, a wider prospect
is thereby opened which enables them to emancipate themselves from the
limitations of a deterministic theodicy as formulated by current doctrine and to
renew their faith in the Divine Creator and his inexhaustible providence. The
fact that Job has the grace to acknowledge this justies Gods faith in them,
which is explicitly expressed in the Epilogue, which is accepted and adapted
by the author as more than the happy ending of a popular story.
However, apart from the wider prospect of the divine purpose disclosed to
the perplexed sufferer to lift him from his self-pity and rebuke his selfrighteousness, raising him into a realm where he may expect ever fresh disclosure of the divine power and grace, the mere fact of Gods self-manifestation
to Job is the effective answer to his real problem. It is this that dispels for him
the dark night of the soul. His suffering does not betoken the alienation of
the sufferer from God as though he were, as the friends alleged, a sinner. The
traditional theology, the systematization of thought about God on the basis of
humans limited experience and understanding is not commensurate with
religion, the encounter with and response to the living God. Having seen
God (42.5a), possibly with the nuance of the courtly idiom in ancient Israel,
having been admitted to the presence of God, Job is relieved of his burden and
freed from his ordeal. With a new assurance to face life and its problems, he
regains his composure. It is only in the personal encounter, granted at length to
Job, that his problem may be solved and he and all humans may be adjusted to
bear his suffering, like the sufferer in Psalm 73, who agonized over the same
problem and found peace of mind in communion with God (Ps. 73.26):
My heart and my esh may fail,
But God is my portion for ever.
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9. The Argument
Here, the sage author of the Book of Job may full the ideal of Wisdom in
maintaining patience in afiction but, like those rallied by the great prophet of
the restoration from the exile, he is prepared to wait upon the Lord that he
might renew his strength (Isa. 40.31).
Part II
COMMENTARY
Job 1 and 2
THE PROLOGUE
As an introduction to the Dialogue (4-27), Jobs curse on the day of his birth
(3), his oath of purgation and its prelude (2931), the Theophany and Divine
Declaration (38.240.2, 6-14) and Jobs response (40.3-5; 42.2-6), the author
of the Book of Job reworks his source in the popular Hebrew form recast in a
patriarchal setting, but showing evidence of elaboration, probably by the
author of the book as late as the end of the sixth century BCE. See further,
General Introduction, pp. 56-75. The narrative prologue to a sapiential work
recalls the Protest of the Eloquent Peasant on social injustice (ANET, 407-10),
the Aramaic Proverbs of Ahiqar (ANET, 427-30) and the Book of Tobit.
The literary form of the Prologue is the oral saga or folk legend, with quick
succession of dramatic events, dramatic direct speech, verbal repetition, round
numbers, seven, three, ve and their multiples, and the remarkable survival of
one man only in all the disasters. This indicates the authors familiarity with
the Job tradition in popular oral form on the subject of a mans faith in Gods
just and benecent providence in face of all appearances to the contrary. The
narrative is reminiscent of the narratives of the Hebrew patriarchs in the
earliest sources of the Pentateuch, but the cadence is more regular and is often
almost as regular as poetry. The assonances, word-plays, rare vocabulary and
forms are more characteristic of poetry than of prose.
The Prologue falls into two parts:
1.
Jobs prosperity (1.1-5), his faith impugned (6-12), the test of
adversity (13-19), Jobs declaration of steadfast faith (20-22).
2.
Further impugning of Jobs faith (2.1-6), the intensication of the test
of his faith (7-8), Jobs faith despite counsels of despair (9-10), the
visit of his friends (11-13).
The scenes in the heavenly court (1.6-12; 2.1-6), which are each followed
by tests of Jobs faith (1.13-19; 2.7-8), are particularly signicant as emphasizing that, however critical the sage intends to be in the Dialogue, he is a constructive writer who is prepared to consider human contingencies sub specie
aeternitatis, which is the view eventually expressed in the Divine Declaration
in the Dialogue (38.240.2, 7-14). As Fohrer (1963b: 69) rightly stresses, the
Prologue emphasizes not the question of the theodicy, but that of human
reaction to the vicissitudes of life, where the attitude of traditional wisdom is
going to be critically examined in the Dialogue.
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120
Job 1 and 2. The Prologue
Chapter 1
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
15.
16.
There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job. And that man was perfect
and upright, fearing1 God and shunning evil.
And seven sons and three daughters were born to him,
and his property was seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, and ve
hundred yoke of oxen, ve hundred she-asses and a great many servants; and that
man was greater than all the peoples of the East.
His sons used to go and hold a feast in one anothers houses day about, and they
would send and invite their three2 sisters to eat and drink with them.
And when the feast-days were over, Job would send and have them puried. He
would get busy in the morning and offer up sacrices for each of them, for Job said:
Perhaps my sons have sinned
And cursed3 God in their mind.
So did Job on all the occasions.
Now one day the celestials came and presented themselves before Yahweh and
among them came also the n. 7. And Yahweh said to the n, Where are you
coming from? And the n answered Yahweh and said:
From going to and fro in the earth
And walking about in it.
Then Yahweh said to the n:
Have you considered4 my servant Job,
How there is none like him in the earth,
A man perfect and upright,
Fearing God and shunning evil?
And the n answered Yahweh and said:
Is it for nothing that Job fears God?
Have you not yourself set a hedge5 completely
About him and his house
And about all that he has?
His undertakings6 you have blessed,
And his cattle have passed all bounds in the land.
But stretch forth your hand
And touch whatever he has,
And he will assuredly curse7 you to your face.
Then Yahweh said to the n:
Lo, all he has is in your power;
Only on himself do not put forth your hand.
And the n went out from the presence of Yahweh.
And one day his sons and daughters were eating and drinking8 in their eldest
brothers house, 14. when a messenger came to Job and said:
The cattle were ploughing
And the she-asses were grazing beside them,9
When the Sabaeans made a raid and took them,
And smote the lads with the edge of the sword,
And I alone escaped to tell you.
While he was yet speaking another came and said:
Lightning fell from the sky
And blasted the sheep and the lads10 and consumed them,
The Book of Job

17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
121
While he was yet speaking another came and said:

The Chaldaeans laid an ambush in three bands,
And broke out against the camels and took them;
The lads they smote with the edge of the sword,
While11 he was yet speaking another came and said:
Your sons and daughters were eating and drinking12
In the house of their eldest brother,
When, lo, a great wind
Came from across the desert
And struck13 the four corners of the house
And it fell on the young people and they were killed,
Then Job rose up and tore his robe and shaved his head and fell on the ground and
did obeisance, 21. and said:
Naked I came out14 of my mothers womb
And naked shall I go away again whither I shall go.
Yahweh gave; Yahweh has taken;
Blessed be the name of Yahweh.
In all this Job did not sin, nor did he ascribe lack of moral discrimination15 to God.
Textual Notes to Chapter 1

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
1
Reading yer for MT wr as in v. 8 with T and two Heb. MSS, omitting w as a
dittograph before y in the rst stage of the Hebrew square script as in the Qumran
texts.
Reading l for MT ele as in v. 2, according to the regular grammar of
Classical Hebrew and with 1 Heb. MS.
MT ra (lit. and blessed), a regular euphemism of the orthodox scribes, to
whom curse God was intolerable.
Lit. applied your heart (sc. mind) to. For MT al we may read el with many Heb.
MSS as in 2.3, a common scribal confusion characteristic of the time when
Aramaic was displacing Hebrew as the spoken dialect in the last pre-Christian
centuries.
MT at is perhaps a scribal error from akko from sa (to screen), but MT
may denote a verb meaning to set a thorn hedge or barrier. See Commentary
ad loc.
Reading maa with LXX, S and T for the singular maah.
Lit. bless, a scribal euphemism; cf. n. 3.
Omitting yayin with S and one Heb. MS as a dittograph of y and m in the preceding
word m in the Hebrew script; cf. 1.4, where eating and drinking is mentioned
without yayin (wine).
Reading the pronominal sufx -hen for MT -hem with ve Heb. MSS in agreement
with the feminine participles.
A possible reading is rm (and [on] the shepherds), so LXX and S, but we
retain MT, which agrees with the reading in v. 17 in a similar context, where there is
no question of a variant in the versions.
For MT a read as in vv. 16 and 17, with many Heb. MSS.
Omitting MT yayin with LXX, S and two Heb. MSS; cf. n. 8.
122
13. Reading wattigga for MT wayyigga in agreement with the subject ra, which is
generally feminine. Alternatively, Tur-Sinai suggests that wayyigga arba
pinn habbayi should be read, and the four corners of the house were
overthrown; cf. Arab. jaaba (to throw down).
14. Reading y for MT y.
15. For MT tilh, LXX reads folly, which probably reects a reading nelh, a word
which means lack of discrimination between right and wrong, the subject of the
Dialogue in Job being just this in Gods moral Order according to the orthodox
faith. See further note on v. 22.
Commentary to Chapter 1
1. The opening of Job, hyh (there was a man), recalls the opening of the
narrative prologue in the Mesopotamian wisdom text commonly known as the
Sumerian Job (van Dijk 1953: 29ff.; Kramer 1955). See above, pp. 1-15.
On the land of Uz in the N. Hejaz see above, pp. 35-36.
Various proposals have been made to explain the name Job (iyy) in
agreement with the subject of the book, for example, the man with whom God
was at enmity or the enemy (y) of God, or the man who eventually
returned (cf. Arab. ba) to God. The name, however, is not ad hoc, as such
views suggest, but is widely attested in the Near East in the second millennium, for instance, in the Egyptian Execration texts from Luxor in the nineteenth century (ybm), the Brooklyn Papyri from Egypt in the eighteenth
century (hybiilu), the Mari texts from the eighteenth or seventeenth centuries
(Ha-a-ia-a-ba-m), the Alalakh tablets from the fteenth to the fourteenth
centuries (Ayabi), administrative texts from the palace of Ras Shamra from the
fourteenth century (Hyabu), the Amarna Tablets in the fourteenth century (Aya-ab). The signicance of the name is probably Where is (God) the Father?
This, to be sure, would agree with the theme of the book, recalling the gibe of
the Bedouin to the disconsolate Doughty, Where is thy God? More relevant
to the Book of Job is the taunt of the ungodly to the sufferer in Ps. 42.2, 11
(EVV 3, 10).
tm weyr and yer elhm (perfect and upright and fearing God) is
characteristic phraseology of wisdom literature; see above, pp. 21-31.
2. Seven sons is the conventional number of saga. Thus in the royal legend of
Krt in the Ras Shamra texts it is promised to the king:
at tq ykrt
The wife thou takest, O Krt,
at tq bbtk
The wife thou takest into thy house,
lmt trb zrk
The damsel thou bringest into thy court,
tld b bnm lk Will bear thee seven sons,
wmn ttmn lk Yea eight times will she bear to thee,
Cf. the psalm in 1 Sam. 2.5 (The barren woman has borne seven sons) and
Ruth 4.15. In the Semitic community, however, daughters were economically
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The Book of Job
123
and morally a liability, hence in the ideal family they were relatively fewer
than the sons; here they are three, to make up the round number of ten
children. In his family and property Job is richly blessed, the due reward for
his conduct according to the retributory view of morality, which is to come
under such severe criticism in the Dialogue.
3. miqneh is ambiguous, meaning both property in general and cattle in
particular, in which a mans wealth was reckoned in the patriarchal age and
society in which the narrative framework of the source of the Book of Job was
cast. Note again the round numbers 10,000 (7000 and 3000) and 1000 (2
500). Job is depicted as a paramount sheikh. The association of camels and
ploughing oxen suggests a semi-nomad milieu such as S. Palestine between
Gaza and Beersheba, where the semi-nomadic Isaac is said to have sown and
reaped (Gen. 26.12). The collective singular auddh is, like miqneh, ambiguous, meaning either servants or slaves. Never at any time had the Israelites any
inhibitions against slavery, whether the slaves were acquired as prisoners of
war (Deut. 21.11-14; cf. Num. 31.26-47) or aliens bought from slave-dealers
(Exod. 12.44; Lev. 22.11; 25.44-45; Eccl. 2.7) or taken in mortgage for debt
(Exod. 21.7ff.; Num. 5.1-5), the only case in which an Israelite could hold a
fellow-Israelite as a slave, it being necessary to release him in the seventh year
if the slave wished to go free (Exod. 21.2-11; Deut. 15.13-14; Jer. 34.14).
Slave-trading by Israelites, however, was condemned as the enterprise of
foreign Phoenicians (Amos 1.9; Ezek. 27.13), Edomites (Amos 1.6, 9) and of
the Greeks (Joel 4.6 [EVV 3.3]). The slave had a certain personal status in
Israel, being protected in the Book of the Covenant against personal injury by
the master (Exod. 21.20, 26-27) and being admitted to the Passover meal if
circumcised (Exod. 12.43) The category of Jobs auddh is not specied, but
in the context of the account of his wealth they were probably slaves. The
wealth of Isaac as a semi-nomad sheikh in the Negeb is similarly described,
with slaves mentioned after cattle, in Gen. 26.14 (J). This enumeration is to be
noted also in administrative tablets from the palace of Ras Shamra (ThureauDangin 1937: 246ff.).
The people of the East (ben-qeem), is vague here as in Gen. 29.1, where
it refers to Aramaeans of N. Mesopotamia, Judg. 3.33; 7.12; 1 Kgs 5.10 (EVV
4.30); Isa. 11.14; Jer. 49.28; Ezek. 25.4, 10. Jobs wisdom is associated with
that of the people of the East whose wisdom was proverbial (1 Kgs 5. 10
[EVV 4.30]), namely the Edomites (Obad. v. 8).
4. In wehle, waw consecutive with the perfect denotes habitual action.
miteh, lit. a drinking feast, though indicating conviviality, need not exclude
a cultic occasion; cf. Amos 2.8. ym, lit. each (on) his day, might denote
an auspicious day, possibly his birthday, but probably means in his turn. In
hiqq yem ham-miteh, in v. 5, it has been feasibly contended that a feast of
several days was denoted, possibly on an annual occasion like the seven days
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124
of the New Year Feast of Tabernacles (Deut. 16.13-15). The sheikh among the
Arabs has always kept open house, establishing his good name by generosity
(Arab. karmu [n]), one of the cardinal Arab virtues. Each one of Jobs sons
must have a like opportunity. The presence of the daughters is exceptional and
indicates the status of Jobs family and the consciousness of a higher ethical
standard in the Jewish community. Convention demanded that Job could not
compromise his dignity by being entertained in his sons houses.
In ele ayhem the feminine numeral with the feminine plural noun is
exceptional, being instanced only in Gen. 7.13, 1 Sam. 10.3 and Ezek. 7.2so
exceptionally, that is, as to be questionable. Here, however, ele may be the
abstract noun trio.
5. On hiqq yem ham-miteh see on v. 4. The verb nqa, to come full
circuit (of time), is found only here in the Hiphil, and in Isa. 29.1 in the Qal;
cf. nqpt in the Ras Shamra texts, for example Gordon UT 52.66-67:
b nt tmt
mnt nqpt d
Seven whole years,

An eighth circuit besides.
Cf. Gordon, UT 75, 45-46.

As in Arab tribal society the father so long as he lived was head of the
household, so Job assumed responsibility for the conduct of his sons though
they were sufciently adult to have houses of their own. Thus he had his sons
sanctied (wayeqaddem), that is, puried from whatever was incompatible
with the sacral society, which every community in antiquity was. This he
effected here and in 42.8 by offering up whole burnt offerings as the patriarchs
had done, an ofce which during the history of Israel was increasingly
restricted to Levites and later priests of the house of Aaron. Again the lavish
sacrice of a whole beast for each of the family (mispar kullm) is a feature of
saga. mispar in this phrase is used adverbially, like the verbal accusative in
Arabic.
wehikm babbqer is generally rendered he would rise early in the
morning; Pope aptly renders he bestirred himself in the morning, observing
that when morning is explicitly mentioned the verb denotes urgency as here,
or, as Jer. 7.13; 25; 11.7; 25.4; 26.5; 32.33; 35.14, 15; 44.4 and Zeph. 3.7 indicate, persistency. The Hiphil indicates a denominative verb from ekem
(shoulder) and is a survival, like many expressions in Classical Hebrew,
from the nomad past, when the rst task in the morning was the striking of
camp and the loading of baggage on the shoulders of beasts of burden. It thus
comes to denote the bestirring of oneself to any enterprise.
e may denote unwitting offence, either moral or ritual, as well as
conscious sin. lt has been suggested that for MT bilem (in their heart) we
should read be lelm, in the exuberance of their heart (Joon 1937:
322), but in this letter-complex the omission of such a distinctive letter as
either in the Old Hebrew or the square script is unlikely. The meaning here is
1
The Book of Job
125
that though convention might forbid articulate deance of God, cursing him
or making light of him, for which MT gives the euphemism blessed, the
mood (heart) of the revellers might have implied such an insult or blasphemy.
6. wayeh hayym followed by waw consecutive and the imperfect of the verb
is the regular expression for there came a day (cf. v. 13; 2.1; 1 Sam. 1.4;
14.1; 2 Kgs 4.8, 11, 18; etc.), the denite article signifying in anticipation the
particular day when the event happened, that is to say a certain day (GKC,
126s) species the day as the New Year day, the second day, when the
heavenly court is held (2.1), being specied as the Day of Atonement, ten days
later then the New Year day according to P. The New Year was associated
with judgment in the postexilic tradition reected in T, but this was not
fortuitous. In ancient Canaan, as indicated in the Baal myth from Ras Shamra,
the New Year festival in late autumn was the great crisis of the peasants year
when the kingship of Baal and his establishment of Order in nature was
celebrated. This occasion was celebrated also in Israel as an agricultural festival, but owing to the precaution in the days of the settlement to have such
festivals celebrated at the central sanctuary of the sacral confederacy, where
the tribes expressed their solidarity by the sacramental experience of the
Exodus and the Covenant, the kingship of Baal in nature was supplanted by
the kingship of Yahweh in nature, in history and in the social order expressed
by the religious and social demands of the Covenant. Throughout the monarchy this was the theme of the New Year festival and the source of the postexilic conception of that as the occasion of the great judgment. It was possibly
the recurrent questioning of Gods moral Order (mip) throughout the
Dialogue in the Book of Job that led the Targumists to consider this as the occasion of the heavenly assize.
ben helhm, lit. the sons of God, denotes divine beings, sons signifying those who belonged to a certain category, or circle, like the sons of the
prophets, or members of prophetic guilds. It originally, as in the Ras Shamra
texts, denoted members of the divine family, and appears in this sense in the
earliest passages in the OT, signifying the gods of other peoples over whom
Yahweh was supreme in Israel, as, for example, in Deut. 32.8:
When the most High assigned the peoples their portion,
When he separated the sons of men,
Fixing the boundaries of the peoples,
According to the number of the gods (ben l, so LXX for MT ben yirl).
The same situation, implying the worship of Yahweh alone in Israel, but
admitting the existence of other gods in other communities, is implied in
Exod. 15.11, which was incorporated into J in the early monarchy:
Who is like you among the gods, O Yahweh?
Who is like you, lordly in holiness?
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126
Cf. Pss. 29.1; 89.7 (ben lm). The present passage reects more closely the
settlement of decisive affairs in the government of the world in a heavenly
court, or assembly (pr bnil, Gordon UT 51.III.14; cf. puur ilani, known in
the Babylonian Creation Myth, Enuma Elish, and mprt bnil in ritual texts
from Ras Shamra, Gordon UT 2.17, 34; 107.3, and an inscription from Byblos,
and dt ilm in Gordon UT 128.II.7, 11). This conception was adopted in Israel
with the theme and imagery of the liturgy of the New Year festival of Canaan,
celebrating the kingship and government (mip) of God, and this is a feature
of the Enthronement Psalms. The conception, however, was so adapted in
Israel that the heavenly court served as a foil to the sole efcacy of Yahweh;
cf. Pss. 96.4-5; 97.7, and particularly Ps. 82.1-5. Later the sons of God were
identied with supernatural forces disposed by God, like the host of heaven
(1 Kgs 22.19) and later the stars, which were beyond the control of humans, of
which there is a reminiscence in Job 38.7 (H.W. Robinson 1943; Cross 1953;
Meyer 1961). Eventually when Israel emerged from monolatry to monotheism
the gods associated with Yahweh were conceived of as angelic forces subservient to him, executors of his will, like the n in Job, or witnesses of the
divine decree, or as intercessors for humans before God; cf. 33.23-24. The
conception of angelic assessors and executives of God in Judaism became
rmly established after the Jews contact with Persian Zoroastrianism in the
late sixth century BCE, though the beginning of this conception may be seen in
the vision of the heavenly court in the episode of Micaiah ben Imlah before
Ahab at the gate of Samaria (1 Kgs 22.19-23) from a prophetic source which
may be dated to the eighth century BCE. In a juncture which concerns the
moral government of God as in the Book of Job, the scene in the divine
assembly retains something of its old signicance in Canaan and in the liturgy
of the New Year festival in Israel.
hiya here denotes taking an acknowledged place; cf. Ps. 82.1, also
depicting the heavenly court, elhm ni baaa-l, God takes his place
in the divine assembly (actually Yahweh takes his place among the other gods
in the Assembly of El, the senior god of the Canaanite pantheon, with whom
Yahweh God of Israel was eventually assimilated as the universal Most High
God). The verb is used in the sense of executives reporting personally to God
for his orders in Zech. 6.5.
On han, Gods public prosecutor, as in Zech. 3.1, and not yet as in 1
Chron. 21.1 the personal arch-enemy of God and humanity, and the relevance
of this passage for the date of Job see above, pp. 32-38. For the development
of the conception of Satan in late Judaism see Bousset and Gressmann (1926).
7. In the reply of the n to Gods question,
From going about (mi) in the earth
And walking up and down in it,
there is what at rst sight seems to be a word-play between n and ,

which describes the activity of Gods agents in terms of the intelligence
1
The Book of Job
127
service of the Persian Empire, the Eyes of Yahweh, in Zech. 4.10. n,
however, as the nal n indicates, is more naturally connected with the verbal
root an, to oppose (Pss. 38.2; 71.13; 109.20), than with , and indeed the
n in Job exceeds his commission as a mere intelligence agent and is rather
the Adversary. The verb is used of going to and fro, as of the people
gathering manna in Num. 11.8, of the ofcers in Davids census of Israel in 2
Sam. 24.2, of the people wandering about seeking water in a drought in Amos
8.12 (in Polel) and of the eyes of the Lord which range all the earth in Zech.
4.10. The complementary verb hihall in the sense of patrolling, or going
about inspecting, recalls the patrols of Zech. 1.10-11; 6.5-7. The description in
1 Pet. 5.8 of Satan going about like a roaring lion is reminiscent of the
passage in Job.
8. Have you considered? (haamt libbe) means Have you set your heart
to?, that is, applied your mind to, the heart being to the Hebrews the seat not
of affection but of cognition. On the reading el for MT al (upon), see textual
note. Job is designated as the servant (ee) of God. The word is ambiguous,
denoting servant, slave and worshipper. Certain persons are singled out as
Gods servants par excellence, for example, kings in ancient Canaan, as, for
instance, Krt in the Ras Shamra texts and David in Israel, or prophets, as
Moses and others in Israel, and the community which will effect the divine
purpose in atonement in Isa. 52.1353.12. The term expresses the dependence
of the servant on the master and the identity of their interests.
Job is again described as tm weyr yer elhm wesr mr; cf. v. 1.
His innocence is thus emphasized and singled out as the subject of testing.
9. The question is raised of the disinterested nature of Jobs reverence of God
(Is it for nothing MT [innm] that Job, fears God?). innm is composed of
n (free grace) with the adverbial ending in -m, which is found in Akkadian
and Ugaritic as reinforcing, or as a substitute for, the preposition (de Langhe
1946); cf. omnm, ymm, pim, rqm.
10. The personal pronoun att is included for emphasis; Job was the special
object of divine favour. at as it is pointed in MT is from , used in Hos.
2.8 (EVV 6) of putting a barrier of thorns in the way of a straying beast. Here it
denotes doing the same to protect property, that is, crops or grain on the
threshing-oor, against beasts. See further, textual note ad loc. miss,
generally in Hebrew meaning around, here probably, like Akk. ana siirti,
adduced by Dhorme, completely.
pra means not only abounded but rather has broken all bounds; cf.
Jacobs ocks (Gen. 30.30).
11. The conditional sentence with the ellipse of the oath in the apodosis and
with the negative after the conditional particle in the protasis is the common
Hebrew idiom for the strong asseverative.
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14. The use of the denite article in hammal, now introduced for the rst
time, indicates the focus of the narrators attention; cf. happl (lit. the
survivor) in Gen. 14.13; see GKC, 126q, r.
bqr is collective singular and masculine, which makes the feminine plural
participle re strange. A. Guillaume emphasizes ploughing with cows and
uses this as an argument for the provenance of the Book of Job from the
Hejaz, citing Doughtys mention of ploughing with kine there.
We think this an extremely tenuous argument. Doughtys kine is as
general as Hebrew bqr, with no implication of sex. The feminine plural
ending of re is probably a scribal inadvertency through the inuence of
the following two words. She-asses were more numerous than males and more
docile and valuable for breeding, where grazing had to be husbanded for the
more productive females with the minimum of males for stud. The asses were
at hand by the ploughing oxen, being used to ride to the elds and to carry the
implements and also to facilitate watching against the sudden razzia.
15. The Sabaeans (e) are to be distinguished from the Shebans of the S.
Arabian mercantile kingdom, which ourished from the tenth century to the
fth century BCE (W.F. Albright 1956: 6-10; Van Beek 1956: 6-9). The
Sabaeans are a N. Arabian people who have possibly left their name in the
Wadi shaba NE of Medinah. wattippl suggests the Hebrew verb nal (to
fall) and is taken as fell upon. There is only one clear instance in the OT of
nal with the preposition be in this sense, namely Josh. 11.7, and the verb in
Job may well have the meaning of plunder; cf. Arab. nafala (to assign
booty), cited in BDB. This may be conveyed by the translation made a raid.
The survival of a single individual in a general disaster is part of the stuff of
the popular folk-tale; cf. the survival of the Hebrews cattle in two of the
plagues of Egypt (Exod. 9.6, 25-26) in the popular elaboration of cult-legend.
16. The popular saga passes on swiftly from one incident to another, and
dramatic effect is heightened by the arrival of one messenger of disaster before
the other has done speaking. This suits the purpose of the sapiential author
admirably as it allows him to come to his proper subject without delay and to
emphasize the cumulative suffering of the innocent man. elhm, lit. re
of God, is lightning; cf. yhwh in the ordeal between Elijah and the devotees
of Baal on Carmel (1 Kgs 18.38; cf. Num. 11.1) and elhm in 2 Kgs 1.12.
al, lit. ate and so consumed, is regularly used with ; cf. 15.34; 20.26,
22.30; etc., and in the Ras Shamra texts, for instance, Gordon UT 75.I.10, kbd
ki tikln, The liver like re they consumed.
17. kadm, read kaldm in Aq., Sym. and V, is the Hebrew term for the
Chaldaean, Aramaic, dynasty of Babylon founded by Nabopolassar. The
Kaldu were Aramaean tribesmen NW of the Persian Gulf, who menaced S.
Mesopotamia like the Arabs in the early seventh century CE, and like them,
1
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129
nally, overran it. kadm probably visualizes the Babylonians rather that the
tribal Kaldu. This may reect a late recension of the narrative source, with a
reminiscence of Chaldaean, Aramaean, Moabite and Ammonite raiding parties
against Judah in the last days of the monarchy (2 Kgs 24.2). The situation
might well have encouraged raids by predatory tribes like the Sabaeans from
the N. Hejaz. Alternatively the association of the kadm with the N. Arabian
Sabeans might refer to Nabonaids occupation of the oases of the Hejaz,
which must have made heavy demands on his commissariat. Jewish settlement
in the region, well attested in the time of Muhammad, was not unlikely after
the disasters under Jehoiakim, Jehoiachim and Zedekiah, and consequent
deportations of leading citizens. See further General Introduction, p. 4.
m, lit. they put, denotes an ambush as in 1 Sam. 15.2, where the verb is
transitive. In this case MT elh rm (three hands, lit. three heads) is an
adverbial accusative and not the direct object of m. This sense of m is
supported by the verb pa which is used of deploying from an ambush in
Judg. 9.33f.; 20.37; 1 Sam. 23.27; 30.14. The verb is probably cognate with
Arab. baaa (to open out, extend), which is also the meaning of Aram. and
Syr. pea.
19. mer hammibr may simply mean from the direction of the desert;
cf. ra hammibr (Jer. 13.24). A whirlwind is probably visualized associated with dust devils, which thus might convey the impression of striking the
four corners of the house simultaneously.
20. ml, as the derivation from lh indicates, means the great robe, Arab.
abayya, which is worn over the tunic, being distinctive of the dignity or
wealth of those who had not to strip for work; cf. 1 Sam. 18.4; 24.5, 12; Ezek.
26.16. The rending of the mantle may be a modication of the laceration of the
skin as a mourning rite, known in Canaan in the fourteenth century BCE; cf. the
mourning of El in the Baal myth of Ras Shamra (Gordon UT 67.VI.11-22):
apnk lpn il dpid
yrd lksi yb lhdm
wlhdm yb lar
yq mr un lri
pr plt lqdqdh
lps yks mizrtm
r babn ydy
psltm byr
yhdy lm wdqn
yl qn zrh
yr kgn aplb
kmq yl bmt
Then the kindly One, El the Merciful,

Came down from the throne, he leapt to the footstool,
And from the footstool he sat on the ground.
He let down his turban in grief from his head;
On his head was the dust in which he wallowed;
He tore asunder the knot of his girdle;
He scraped his skin with a stone;
With a chipped int for a razor;
He shaved his side-whiskers and beard;
The humeral joint of his arm he scored;
He scored his chest like a garden,
As a valley-bottom his back he lacerated.
The shaving (gzaz) of the head is already known as a rite of mourning (Jer.
2.29; Amos 9.10; Mic. 1.16; etc.). It is one of the rites of separation whereby a
1
130
person suspends his normal behaviour and appearance in the interim period
necessary to the readjustment of the community or family, when it is more
than normally exposed to supernatural inuences with evil potential. For the
shaving of the head as a rite of separation, cf. the treatment of a captive
woman before remarriage (Deut. 21.11-12). Such rites were eventually forbidden in Israel because of their association with the superstitions of Canaan (cf.
Deut. 14.1; Lev. 19.27-28), but survivals persisted.
In wayyit the explanation of the form as the Hithpael of the verb
(w) has been questioned since Albrights recognition of the reexive of
the causative Shaphel in Ugaritic corresponding to the Xth form of the Arabic
verb itaqala. This is formally possible, but must be doubtful so long as the
assumed root w(w) is not attested in the simpler forms in Ugaritic, Hebrew
or Arabic, whereas (w) is attested (Isa. 51.23). The meaning, however, is
not doubted, to prostrate oneself, lit. to touch the ground with ones forehead, the gesture of total submission to humans or God.
21. Jobs submission to the will of God, expressed in obeisance, is declared in
his citation of a proverb:
Naked I came out of my mothers womb,
And naked I shall go away again whither I shall go.
This and the following couplet,

Yahweh gave; Yahweh has taken;
Blessed be the name of Yahweh,
are the classical expression of the truth that mortals hold life and all that it can
give on a terminable lease from God. Occasionally the Hebrew thought
scientically of birth, occasionally poetically of the origin of humanity
(m) from the dust of the earth (amh) or of being fashioned in the
hidden depths of the earth (Ps. 139.15). The two conceptions are combined in
Ps. 139.13, 15, and so too possibly in Job 1.21 (so Tur-Sinai), where mh
cannot refer literally to the womb, where a human does not return. It has been
thought that the reference is to a return to mother earth (so Mowinckel,
Larcher [JB]; cf. Ben Sira 40.1), or that here is a reminiscence of burial in a
crouched position like the embryo in the womb, which may once have
reected the conception of the earth as the mother of humans (so Ricciotti
1955). Buttenwieser and Hlscher see an echo of the Egyptian euphemism for
death, those who are yonder. amh may be used here with a demonstrative
sense independent of my mothers womb, as in Eccl. 5.14:
Even as he has come forth from his mothers womb
Naked shall he depart as he came.
mh may then be admittedly vague, indicating the ultimate uncertainty of

the ancients as to the end of life (so Horst, Fohrer). The verb does not
1
The Book of Job
131
necessarily mean that mh is identical with the place of origin. It may rather
denote here the going back not to but from a certain estate, to go away again.
In v. 21b the use of the divine name Yahweh as distinct from El, Eloah,
Shaddai (the Almighty) and Elohim in the poetic Dialogue is characteristic
of the Prologue and Epilogue. It has been noticed as characteristic of the prose
as distinct from the poetic portions of the book. The latter distinction does not
apply here, where Jobs declaration is in poetry, but in the general context of
the Prologue it is admissible, in any case probably reproducing a well-known
formula from a fast-liturgy, the context of the Plaint of the Sufferer. The
phraseology is re-echoed among the Arabs, where A. Musil cites the acknowledgment of the next of kin among the Bedouin of the Hejaz, the Lord gave
him; the Lord has taken him (1927: 427). The last phrase too recalls the
Arabic al-amdu lillhi (Praise be to Allah!), which is added to the report
of ill as well as good, in which case ala(y) kulli li (in any condition) will
be added.
22. signies missed the mark, hence sinned, offended, wittingly or
unwittingly.
tilh suggests tl (insipid), hence our translation lack of moral
discrimination. It has been suggested that the word is cognate with Arab.
tafala (to spit) (Tur-Sinai, Pope), giving a meaning reprehensible. But in
view of the obvious meaning of tl in 6.6 we prefer the meaning derivative
from insipid. On the LXX variant nelh, see textual note ad loc. The moral
sense of tilh is attested in Jer. 23.13 of the prophets of Samaria who
prophesied by Baal and misled people, and possibly in Ps. 109.4.
Chapter 2
1.
3.
4.
Then one day the celestials came and presented themselves before Yahweh and
among them came also the n to present himself before Yahweh.1 2. And
Yahweh said to the n, Where do you come from?, and the n answered
Yahweh and said:
From going to and fro in the earth
And from walking about in it.
Yahweh said to the n:
Have you considered my servant Job,
How there is none like him in the earth,
A man perfect and upright,
Fearing God and shunning evil,
And holding fast to his integrity,
Though you have moved me against him to hurt him without cause?
And the n answered Yahweh and said:
Skin for skin;
All that a man2 has
Will he give for his life.
132
5.
6.
7.
9.
10.
11.
12.
But stretch out your hand

And touch his bone and his esh,
And he will assuredly curse you3 to4 your face.
And Yahweh said to the n:
Here he is, in your power,
Only spare his life.
Then the n went out from Yahwehs presence and struck Job with a bad pox
from the sole of his foot to his head; 8. and he took a potsherd to scrape himself, and
sat in the ashes.5
And his wife said to him:
Do you still hold to your integrity?
Curse God and die!
But Job said to her:
You speak like one6 of the obtuse women.
Are7 we to accept good from God
And not accept ill?
In all this Job did not sin with his lips.
Now Jobs three friends heard of all the calamity which had befallen him and they
came from their several places, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and
Zophar the Naamathite. They arranged to meet together and go and condole with
him and console him.
And they lifted up their eyes from the distance but did not recognize him, and they
raised their voices and wept, and each tore his robe and they sprinkled dust on their
heads (casting it up).8 13. And they sat with him (on the ground)9 for seven days and
seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his grief was very
great.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
MT lehiya
al-yhwh (to present himself before God) is omitted in the original

version of LXX, being included in Origens recension from the versions of Theod.
and Aq. It is thought that it should be omitted here as a scribal inadvertency since it
is not included in 1.6. But since the n was reporting back to Yahweh after his
rst trial of Job it may be retained.
Reading le for MT l with LXX, S and T.
A scribal euphemism as in 1.5; see textual note ad loc.
Reading with certain Heb. MSS al for MT el, as in 1.11.
LXX has a long addition here. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading min after aa with two Heb. MSS, S and T.
As the text is set out in BH3, gam is taken with what precedes, in which case it
demands att (you) after it, the pronoun being omitted by haplography before the
following e. It was taken by the ancient versions with what follows in MT (so
Dhorme; G.B. Gray). Ball proposed to read the interrogative particle im for gam,
introducing the rhetorical question, which LXX indicates, reading the sequel as a
conditional sentence.
MT hamyemh should probably be omitted with LXX; see Commentary ad loc.
MT lre should probably be omitted with LXX and two Heb. MSS. Strictly, if the
friends sat with Job they would sit on the refuse heap.
The Book of Job
133
Commentary on Chapter 2
3. The verb bla is most familiar in the OT meaning to swallow up, and
may mean total annihilation. But Job is not totally annihilated, so we take the
verb as a cognate of Arab. balaa (to reach) in the same hostile sense as
na (lit. to touch) in v. 5. Arab. balaa means also to hurt or attack.
This meaning would be more apt than to swallow at 8.18; 10.8; 2 Sam.
20.19; Ps. 52.6, harmful words/false tongue.
4. The n possibly cites a proverb in reply. r bea-r has been the
subject of much speculation and debate. It is generally regarded as the citation
of a proverb reecting the practice of barter (so Calmet, Duhm), where skin
is used as our head of cattle, the point being equivalence in moral dealing. In
support of this interpretation Hlscher cites the Arab proverb r bir; cf.
bta kma bti in an Ugaritic deed of exchange (RS 16.283) published by J.
Nougayrol (1955: RS 16.383) and cited by Horst. The difculty in this
interpretation is that the preposition would not normally be bea but taa,
which means in place of. bea means usually about or for the sake of.
Following the rst sense of bea, the phrase is translated one skin is over
another, or, as we might say under the skin there is still the quick (so
Schultens, Budde, Merx, Jastrow, Lindblom). Popes objection that as yet
Jobs skin has not yet been touched ignores the gurative sense of skin. TurSinai takes skin as denoting the various layers protecting the heart, the seat
of life, hence Pope translates skin after skin. Following the second sense of
bea, T and Rashi understood the phrase to mean that one will risk and suffer
injury to one part of the body to protect a more vital part, or to acquiesce in the
loss of property and children to save ones own skin (St Thomas Aquinas).
The phrase is not to be considered apart from the following: All that a man
has will he give for (bea) his life. Dhorme suggests that r bead-r is a
gure drawn not from commerce but from law, reecting the principle an eye
for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, etc. (Exod. 21.24ff.), where, incidentally the
preposition is not bea, but taa. The sense according to Dhorme would be
that as in retaliation a skin wound only is allowed for a skin wound, what Job
has so far suffered cannot be expected to provoke violent reaction, but if his
life, or at least the full capacity to enjoy it, were threatened Jobs faith would
be really tried. In view of the meaning of bea, for the sake of, in kl aer
l yittn bea na this is a feasible interpretation. Alternatively we might
propose the emendation be r of which the assumption that MT is
a corruption is graphically feasible, and even more so if w of MT wel is
attached to the preceding r resulting in the reading
be r
kl aer l yittn bea na
His skin is still about him;
All that a man has will he give for the sake of his life.
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134
This is admittedly a conjecture, with no support in the ancient versions, but it

has the merit of congruity with the sequel and it gives an extra beat, which the
meter, such as it is in the passage, demands. Nevertheless we prefer Dhormes
interpretation.
nee should be noted here. The word does not mean soul as distinct from
body as in the Greek or Christian conception of life, but the life-breath or life
itself. It may also denote the full capacity to enjoy life, English vitality, the
impairment of which is denoted in certain passages of the OT as death
(mwe) which is considered as invading life to various degrees in human
suffering.
7. Various suggestions have been made, generally with a certain amount of
medical support, to diagnose more particularly Jobs skin disease (see bibliography in Rowley 1958: 169-70), but the evidence in Job is insufcient.
Since the case is hypothetical, to serve as an introduction to the moral problem
of the book, we refrain from more precise speculation as to whether the disease
be visualized as black, or tubercular, leprosy or elephantiasis, eurythema,
chronic eczema, or, as Terrien suggests (1963: 59) pamphigus foliaceus. The
only clue is that Job erupted in boils. en, from a root attested in Akkadian,
Ugaritic, Aramaic and Arabic meaning to be hot, or inamed, is rendered in
S as ulcers, which, so far as may be specied, suggests the Nile rash as
Jobs disease; cf. the Egyptian boil as one of the plagues threatened in Deut.
28.27, and as one of the plagues of Egypt in Exod. 9.8ff.
qoq, lit. skull, is usually poetic for head in Hebrew, as, for example,
in Deut. 28.35; 2 Sam. 14.25, but regularly means head in Ugaritic texts.
Jobs potsherd (ere) may have been not to relieve his itch, but rather to
scrape off running matter, as the verb higr suggests (so LXX).This verb is a
hapax legomenon, and is cognate with the Arabic verb jarada which is used of
scraping hair off a hide or peeling the bark off a tree.
In her the refuse of baking ovens, cooking hearths and broken pots and
generally the village midden (Arab. mazbala) is visualized, as particularly in
LXX, which translates kopria. This steadily mounting heap of refuse in Arab
villages is periodically burnt, and the mound outside the settlement is often a
place where the natives take the evening air. It was a natural place of isolation
outside the settlement for such as Job (cf. the lepers in 2 Kgs 7.3), but it did
not absolutely deny him the company of such as his three friends.
9. Christian dogmatics has made capital out of the role of Jobs wife, whom St
Augustine calls the Devils Abettor (Diaboli adjutrix); cf. Calvin, the instrument of Satan (organum Satanae). St Thomas Aquinas after Chrysostom and
St Augustine regards woman as the natural intermediary between a man and
the tempter as Eve was the intermediary between the man and the serpent. The
Rabbis note the parallel between Eve and Jobs wife, but remark that Job
unlike Adam resisted the temptress.
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The Book of Job
135
Curse (MT bless) God and die may mean either Curse God, since in any
case you are going to die or since God has deprived you of blessing and
made your life void as a dead man, accept the fact of alienation from him and
make it nal. This touches the central problem of the book. Did suffering
mean alienation from God? Or was it to be borne in hope and faith that
expected response in suffering, where God was ready to help the sufferer in
his own time and manner?
The role of the wife, abetted by Jobs friends, as 42.7 may imply, to undermine the faith of Job in Gods benecence was probably part of the immediate
source of the present Book of Job. LXX has a considerable expansion here in
the style of midrash (Swete, 2.9, 9a-d):
After the lapse of a long time (his wife said to him), How long will you hold
out saying, See, I will wait a little longer, looking for the hope of my salvation? See, your memory is already wiped out from the earth, sons and
daughters, the pains and labours of my womb, for whom I laboriously strove for
nothing. You yourself sit in wormy decay, the whole night in the open, while I
roam as a drudge from place to place and from house to house, waiting for the
sun to go down, that I may rest from my labours and pains which grip me. But
say some word against the Lord and die. But he looked on her and said to her
This is part of the very substantial elaboration of the Job legend, which
emphasizes the patience of the sufferer, ignoring his embarrassing questioning
of the faith of orthodox wisdom in the Dialogue as distinct from the Prologue
and Epilogue of the Book of Job.
10. nl, a synonym of kesl (fool) in Prov. 17.21, means generally
churlish and contrasts with wise and prudent. It signies one whose conduct is governed by regard for reason or popular repute. In Isa. 32.5ff., it is
contrasted with a, noble, a gentleman who behaves as such, to whom the
community looks to uphold its fair ethic, like the good man of birth on whom
the community depends on Job 29. The nl is animated by none of the ner
susceptibilities, which attest the spirit of God in a person. He is the moral
deadwood of society, as the possible connection with nelh (a dead body)
may indicate. The aspect of nl as godless is emphasized by W.W.M.
Roth (1960).
The Piel of qal in the sense receive is attested in Ugaritic and in the OT
only once before the Exile, in Prov. 19.20. The regularity of the verb in
Aramaic and Syriac and its recurrence in Ezra, Chronicles, and Esther suggests
that there as in the present passage it may be a Hebrew usage which fell into
desuetude but revived under the inuence of Aramaic in the postexilic period.
ra in this context means ill or calamity without the moral implication of
evil. In from God note the Hebrew emphasis on primary causes. In an
original, pre-Israelite source God may have been represented by the guardian
spirit of the individual, whose alienation is betokened by the afictions of the
1
136
sufferer in the Mesopotamian plaint ludlul bl nmeqi I.43-46, designated

either as the sufferers god or his good daemon (du dimqi) or his protecting genius (lamassu).
11. Here Jobs three interlocutors in the Dialogue are introduced. It is thought
by Alt (1937; so too Fohrer 1989: 104) that they are secondary, being introduced by the author of the Book in its present form in place of Jobs own
community (cf. 42.11), who like his wife sought to assail his orthodox faith.
habbh, but for the Masoretic punctuation, which indicates the perfect
after the denite article with the force of the relative pronoun, might be a
participle, which, however, does not alter our translation.
Eliphaz is given as the son of Esau (Gen. 36.4) and father of Teman (Gen.
36.11), hence an Edomite; cf. Teman as a place-name in Edom in Amos 1.12;
Ezek. 25.13 (Edom from Teman to Dedan); Obad. 8f. and particularly Jer.
49.7 in his oracle on Edom, Is wisdom no longer to be found in Teman?
Bildad is unknown elsewhere in the OT, but Shuah is given as the son of
Abraham by Qeturah (Gen. 25.2), who with her other sons was sent to the
East. Fohrer after Albright suggests a connection of Shuhite with u by the
mid-Euphrates. Zophar is not mentioned elsewhere in the OT, but his
designation as the Naamathite may refer to Jebel Naameh east of Tebuk in
the N. Hejaz. All are chosen by the Israelite redactor of the source as representative of the reputedly wise people of the East, and particularly, in the
case of Eliphaz, with Edom.
wayyiwwa denotes both agreement and meeting by appointment. To
condole with him (ln-l) means lit. to shake the head, or rock the body
to and fro for him.
12. In MT and they sprinkled dust on their heads (to the sky), LXX omits to
the sky. Dhorme posits a conation of two variants, they sprinkled dust on
their heads, a mourning rite (cf. 1 Sam. 4.12; Ezek. 27.30; Lam. 2.10), and the
mourning rite mentioned in the citation from the Baal myth from Ras Shamra
(see note on 1.20), and they threw dust up into the sky so that it fell on their
heads, or as intervening between them and God to indicate alienation in
suffering. The letter would recall the gesture of the Jews at the martyrdom of
Stephen (Acts 22.23), where, however, it is rather designed to register horror
at what was regarded as blasphemy and so to rid the subjects from the
attention of God. On this assumption Buttenwieser (1922: 43) takes it to refer
to the friends condemnation of Job, arguing from his suffering to his sin. This
strangely ignores the statement in 2.11 that the friends come to condole and
console (lenaam). Tur-Sinai suggests that hamyemh is a corruption of
the innitive absolute of the Hiphil, a verbal noun used adverbially, hamm
(dumbfounded), which was inadvertently omitted from the following verse
(cf. Ezek. 3.15; Ezra 3.3-4), and added in the margin, then displaced and
repointed. The verb zraq is that used of the rite whereby Moses cast up ashes
to induce the plague of boils in Egypt (Exod. 9.8f.).
1
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137
12. The gesture of the friends, sitting silently with Job in his ritual isolation,
whether or not on the ground is read with MT or omitted with LXX and two
Heb. MSS, is a striking token of their sympathy. They too for the conventional
mourning period of seven days and seven nights (cf. Gen. 50.10; 1 Sam.
31.13) were prepared to consider themselves under the cloud of the divine
displeasure through their association with the sufferer and so alienated from
the community and its association with God. Their tactful silence is designed
not to provoke a hasty retort on the subject of the divine economy. Job
himself, quite unprovoked, rst broke silence in his curse of his existence, to
which his wife had rst provoked him (2.9). This (3.1) is the culmination of
the Prologue as well as the immediate introduction to the Dialogue.
Job 3
JOBS EXPOSTULATION
Jobs curse on his existence, to which the whole of the chapter is devoted,
while not directly the curse of God which his wife had urged on him (2.9),
comes very near to it, in the implicit animadversion on the Giver of life.
Signicantly, Job does not yet question the justice of God in the suffering of
the innocent in his personal case. His concern is a general problem of the
meaningfulness of a life lived in unrelieved suffering, as of course exemplied
in his own. In any case his impassioned outburst, contravening the sapiential
ideal of calm resignation, serves to introduce Eliphazs mild rebuke (4.3-6)
and the subsequent censure of all the friends. It further sets Jobs problem
beyond academic discussion into the domain of existential experience, which
characterizes Jobs subsequent declarations as distinct from those of the
friends in the Dialogue and his ultimate appeal directly to God.
The chapter is divided into three strophes, vv. 3-10, 11-19, 20-26. After the
statement in v. 1 that Job cursed the day he was born, which is the culmination
of the Prologue as adapted by the author of the Book, the rst strophe (vv. 310) expresses the despair of the sufferer in the literary form of a curse. This
leads in the second strophe (vv. 11-19) to the question of the meaning of his
life when he is in such hard case, and in the third strophe (vv. 20-26) to the
question of the meaning of human life in general, in which suffering is such a
common lot. Thus while vv. 11-19 express the subjects sufferings within the
common convention of the literary prototype of the Plaint of the Sufferer, vv.
20-26 open up the philosophic question of the meaning of life itself, where
experience often affords so little support to faith in Providence. In the last
section the apparent shift from the general case in vv. 20-23 to the particular in
the rst person in vv. 24-26 may be explained by assuming that vv. 24-26 is a
citation from the Plaint of the Sufferer. The curse on a particular day including
the day on which the sufferer was born is familiar in Arab society (Dhorme),
and, as applied by the sufferer himself has its counterpart in Jer. 20.14-18,
which recalls the language and thought of much of Job 3.3-10, particularly in
the wish that he might have been still-born and the reference to the announcement of his birth. The curse is more elaborate in Job with notable wealth of
mythological imagery.
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The arrangement of MT may be questioned. In vv. 4, 5 and 6 it is important

to realize that the arrangement is not in bicola but tricola, the threefold curse
perhaps reecting a convention of incantations. We should thus defend MT
against the view that the passage is interpolated by later insertions, for
example, v. 4a and v. 6a according to Bickell, Beer, Stevenson and Hlscher,
but admit that v. 6 was possibly followed by the tricolon in v. 9 (so Dhorme,
Pope). Verse 16, which interrupts the thought of vv. 15-17, may be displaced
from after v. 11 (so Dhorme), in which case MT l would require to be
emended to l (would that).
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
9.
7.
8.
10.
11.
16.
12.
13.
14.
15.
17.
18.
1
After this Job opened his mouth and cursed the day he was born.
Then Job spoke up1 and said:
Perish the day on which I was born
And the night on which one declared, Let a man-child be conceived.
That daylet it be darkness;
Let God from above not care for it,
Nor let light shine on it.
Let darkness and utter gloom claim it as its own.2
Let cloud settle upon,
May eclipse surprise it.
That nightlet darkness seize it,
Let it not be associated with3 the days of the year,
Nor be entered into the number of the months.
May the stars of its twilight be darkened,
Let it wait for light which shall never be,
And let it not be seen4 by the eyes of the dawn.
5
That nightlet it be barren,
Let no joyful shout come therein.
Let those curse it who curse day (light),
Who are skilled to rouse Leviathan,
Because I did not close up the doors of the womb that bore me
And hide trouble from my eyes.
Why did I not die at birth,
Emerge from the wombto expire?
6Would that7 I were as a still-born child,
Like babes that never saw the light!6
Why did the knees receive me?
And what was the signicance of breasts to suck?
For now I should have been lying down quiet,
I should have slept and had rest,
Just as kings and counsellors of the earth,
Who built themselves palaces,
Or as princes who had gold,
Who lled their houses with silver.
There the wicked cease from troubling
And the weary are at rest;
Prisoners are at ease together,
Hearing no taskmasters voice.
140
Job 3. Jobs Expostulation
19.
Small and great are the same there,

And slave is free from master.
20.
Why is light given8 to one in trouble,

Life to those whose life is bitter,
Who long in vain for death,
And seek for it as9 for hidden treasure,
Who rejoice to reach the burial-heap,10
Are happy to have found a grave?
(Why is light given) to a man whose way is diverted,
For instead of my food comes my sighing;
My groans are poured out as water.
For what I feared has come to me,
And what I dreaded comes upon me.
I have no rest nor quiet,
Nor repose, but disturbance has come upon me.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.

LXX and V omit MT wayyaan through a misunderstanding of the verb, which they
take in the sense common in Classical Hebrew and he answered. Job, of course,
does not answer, but speaks for the rst time. Actually the verb is common in the
myths and legends of Ras Shamra, where there is no question of answering, and
where it means spoke up.
2. We take gal to signify guratively the claim exercised by darkness for its kindred
manifestations over against the kindred manifestations of light. The verb gal
means to stain, which is spelt as gal in Zeph. 3.1; Lam. 4.14; Isa. 59.3; 63.3;
Mal. l.7; Ezra 2.62 = Neh. 7.64; Dan. 1.8. The dates of those passages from the late
seventh century to the second century BCE indicates that this meaning is possible in
Job without emending to gal. See further Commentary ad loc.
3. For MT yiadd, from (to rejoice) read the jussive Qal ya, from ya (to
be united), with Sym., V, T and S.
4. Reading the Niphal yreh for MT yireh.
5. Omitting MT hinnh metri causa with LXX, S, V and one Hebrew MS.
6. The couplet breaks the sense of vv. 15-17, and obviously goes with v. 11, either as
part of the original text or a marginal gloss expanding v. 11, which would more
easily account for its transposition to after v. 15 in MT. , which is superuous to
the meter, was probably added after the transposition.
7. Reading the optative particle l for MT l.
8. Reading the passive yuttan with LXX, S, T and V for MT active yittn.
9. Reading kemamnm (as hidden treasure) for MT mimmamnm, which would
mean more than for hidden treasure. This is possible, but the simile is more
natural. We assume a scribal error of m for k in the Old Hebraic script.
10. gl may originally have been written in scriptio defectiva, which would be
intentionally ambiguous, gl (joy) or gal (burial heap).
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141
1. It has been suggested that his day (ym) is not the day he was born but
his fate (so Tur-Sinai), but in view of the immediate reference to the day of
my birth, etc., and of Jeremiahs similar curse on the day of his birth (Jer.
20.14-18), his day probably refers to the day of Jobs birth as indicated by
the immediate sequel.
3. In ym iwwle b the omission of the denite article before ym and of
the relative particle aer before the relative clause are features of poetry.
Dhorme notes the imperfect as a veritable Aorist. This may be equated with
the Akkadian preterite, which had the same signicance as the Greek Aorist.
The so-called narrative imperfect in the Ras Shamra myths and legends has the
same signicance.
MT hallayelh mar hrh ger has been questioned on the grounds that
the indenite subject of mar, unlike the announcer of the birth, could not tell
the sex of the child conceived, and so it is proposed either to emend hrh to
harh, the Aramaic interjection, Behold! (so Beer, Budde, Stevenson, after
LXX) or to take hallayelh (masc. as in v. 6) as the subject of mar (so Horst,
Fohrer, Pope). MT, however, might feasibly be defended on three counts. If the
subject of mar is indenite the reference might be to an anniversary celebration of the conception of a man (so Hlscher), or if the reference is to the
actual night of conception the perfect might be optative as often in Ugaritic
and regularly in Arab., the night on which one said, Let a man-child be
conceived , referring to the consummation of the Oriental wedding with its
embarrassingly public celebration. Alternatively the subject of the verb might
be God, who could determine both conception and sex. Our preference is for
the optative sense of the Pual hrh. The preposition with the resumptive
pronominal sufx in the relative clause is probably omitted metri causa, being
in any case understood after the preposition and pronominal sufx in v. 3a.
4. In al-yireh the verb has the same meaning to care for as in Deut.
11.12, where it is used of the land of Canaan as the special object of Gods
attention, and in Isa. 62.12, where it is used of Jerusalem in antithesis to the
neglected (azh) city. nehrh, light, a hapax legomenon in the OT, from
the verbal root nhar, to shine (Isa. 60.5; Ps. 34.6), is more common in
Aramaic; cf. nehr (Dan. 2.22). Here it may have the meaning daylight; cf.
Arab. nahru(n).
5. In yiluh Aq., T, Dhorme, Stevenson and Tur-Sinai read yialh, may
the darkness stain it, a sense which gal also has in Zeph. 3.1; Lam. 4.14;
Isa. 59.3; 63.3; Mal. 1.7; Ezra 2.62 = Neh. 7.64; Dan. 1.8. Theod. renders
anchisteusato (performed the kinsmans part) and Sym antepoisato (ransomed), hence claim as its own (so Hlscher, Horst, Fohrer, Pope). S and
1
142
the Arab. versions render obfuscate or cover up, which, with the meaning
protect, is the primary sense claimed for gal (to play the kinsmans part)
by A.R. Johnson, The Primary Meaning of gaal, VTS 3 (1953), pp. 67-77.
While this meaning claimed by Johnson would suit Job 3.5 and the phrase
gl haddm, he suggests no etymology, and the question is still open as to
whether the verb is primarily denominative, signifying to discharge a kinsmans duties, which was primarily rehabilitation to an acknowledged status or
afnity within a given groupwhich would be intelligible at Job 3.5or a
pure verb such as Johnson assumes, of which to play the kinsmans part is
secondary. We favour the former alternative, taking gal on the evidence of
the OT to mean not simply protection from something that menaces the
subject, but rehabilitation to a status one has actually lost; cf. Snaith (1963),
who maintains that the primary meaning of the verb denotes restoration to
proper ownership, to which we should add afnity. We understand almwe
as a compound noun, mwe having a superlative signicance.
annh is a hapax legomenon in the OT, being the particular noun (nomen
unitatis) from the more common generic nn. The verb an, used of the
cloud, recalls the cloud which signied the abiding Divine Presence (enh)
over the Tabernacle in the Exodus tradition (Exod. 40.35; Num. 9.17).
yebaauh is generally taken to mean terrify. It may rather be cognate of
Arab. baata (to come suddenly upon, surprise), a more apt description of a
solar eclipse, the rst of which to be scientically predicted was that on 28
May 585 BCE by Thales of Miletus. For this sense of ba, cf. 18.11; 33.7.
For MT kimerr ym we should probably read kamrr ym (blackness of
day) (Dhorme); cf. Stevenson, who proposed to read kamrrm, omitting ym
as a dittograph. The plural of kamrr has cognates with the same sense in Akk.
and Syr. Dhorme suggested the obscurity of the sirocco, but the Akk. cognate
kamru (to cover) suggests rather the eclipse, which is supported by the verb
yebaat (to come suddenly upon, surprise).
6. yad (let it be associated with) is obviously demanded by the context
instead of MT yiadd (rejoice).
9. nee is the twilight both of dawn (Ps. 119.147) and evening (Job 7.4;
24.15; etc.). ke (stars) in the context may be dual rather than plural, the
Venus star in its twin role of morning and evening star, r (dawn) and lm
(completion, sc. of day) in Canaanite mythology (Gordon UT 52). Here and
at 41.10 aapp aar (the eyes of dawn) is intelligible as a reection of
Canaanite mythology in Hebrew poetry. The dual aapp means eyes
rather than eyelids of NEB, as is indicated by pp in parallel with q (eye
ball) in the Ugaritic text (Gordon UT Krt 148, 295). NEB renders the phrase at
41.18 the shimmer of dawn, connecting aapp with a verb cognate with
Syr. a (to shine).
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7. For galm, meaning here and at 15.34 barren, Dhorme cites Isa. 49.21,
where galmh is parallel to eklh (with no children); cf. galmh in the
Talmud, signifying a wife who must live apart without relations with her husband. Arab. jalmdu(n) denotes rocky, sterile ground, as in Job 30.3; cf. a wife
as a fertile eld in the correspondence of Ribaddi of Byblos in the Amarna
Tablets (Knudtzon 190815: 74.17; 75.15; 81.51), My land is like a woman
without a husband, for it has not been ploughed, and in the Ras Shamra text
Gordon UT 77.22-23, referring to the marriage of the Moon-god and the
Moon-goddess:
I will make her fallow land into a vineyard,
The fallow eld of her love into orchards.
Cf. Song 1.6; 4.12-16; 8.12; and probably the original of the Song of the
Vineyard, my lovesong (r d cited by Isa. 5.1-7). rinnh signies a
ringing shout of joy.
8. yiqqe is the imperfect not of nqa (to mark, pierce), but of qa, here
a synonym of rar (to curse), and denotes a specic curse such as Balaam
was requested to pronounce against Israel (Num. 22.11, 17; 23.8, 11, 13, 25,
27; 24.10), where the verb qa is uniformly used. Professional mourners are
not denoted, as Calmet proposed, but possibly sorcerers who might make a
day inauspicious, and Dhorme connected it with Jobs curse in v. 1, considering it as relating to all unfortunates, citing the drab curse on the day of an
adversary. MT ym, however, has been questioned, though it is unanimously
supported by the Hebrew MSS and ancient versions. Leviathan in the parallel
colon indicates a mythological reference. In view of the signicance of
Leviathan as a primaeval monster, the power of Chaos par excellence, like the
Sea (ym), Gunkel (1895: 59 n. 1) suggested that MT ym (day) should be
pointed ym (sea), a suggestion adopted by Beer, Cheyne, Horst, Pope,
Lvque and G.R. Driver, who cites an Aramaic incantation I will cast spells
upon you with the spell of the Sea and the spell of the dragon Leviathan
(1955: 72); so too C.H. Gordon (1966). Horst and Pope invoke the evidence of
the Ras Shamra texts, where this signicance of Sea and Leviathan is well
attested. But the same texts refer to day (of battle) of the Sun and the Manyheaded One, even the dragon (tnn), in a hymn to the Sun (Gordon UT 62.4452), so interpreted by A. Caquot (1959: 93ff.). This would support MT ym (so
Hitzig, Budde, Hlscher, Fohrer, Tur-Sinai, Mowinckel), the reference being
to an eclipse of the sun, which according to Egyptian mythology was the result
of the serpent Apophis swallowing the sun. In support of this interpretation we
might cite the incantation text from Ras Shamra against snake-bite, where the
power of the sun is invoked and there is, on our interpretation,1 reference to
1. See the writers study of this text in the official publication in Ugaritica VI
(Schaeffer [ed.] 1969: 79-97).
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144
the Apophis myth in its Canaanite counterpart. The conception of the Primaeval monster of Chaos temporarily subdued but still capable of being roused
(cf. rr liwyn) is familiar from Amos 9.3. means ready as in Aram.
and Syr., but the Arab. cognate means with all equipment prepared, hence
here able and having the relevant incantations and ritual, so skilled.
10. bin, lit. my belly, obviously means the womb that bore me. For MT
wayyastr (and it hid), LXX, in rendering it turned away (trans.), read either
wayysar or perhaps misunderstood MT wayyastr as the Iphteal of sr,
namely wayyistar, a verbal form attested in the Mesha inscription and in the
Ugaritic texts. This would be rather an intransitive reexive, and the direct
object eyes supports MT.
11. Note m in parallelism with the perfect y being imperfect in form,
but preterite in sense, like the narrative imperfect in the Ras Shamra texts; see
above on v. 3. The perfect y is used before the imperfect ew to
denote that the action is prior to that of the second verb, which may be taken
as the verb in a nal clause.
16. On the reading of v. 16 after v. 11 see Introduction to ch. 3.
nel, from the root nal, which is used of dropping from the womb (Isa.
26.18), is specically used of abortions (Ps. 58.9, which have not seen the
sun); cf. Eccl. 6.3. mn, lit. hidden, recalls the fate of the abortion
enveloped in darkness in Eccl. 6.4-5.
12. madda qiddemn birkyim (Why did the knees receive me?) implies,
according to some commentators (Duhm, Musil, citing the Arab custom among
the Hanajira, Arabia Petraea, III, 1927, p. 214), the fathers acknowledgment
of the child (cf. Gen. 50.23). It may, however, simply describe the nursing of
the child (so Dhorme, citing the nursing by the city-goddess of Nineveh; so
too Budde, Weiser, Horst). For the use of qiddm in parallel with Aram.
qibbl, to receive (cf. 2.10), of a mother with her child, Dhorme cites Ben
Sira 15.2.
mah, as the parallel madda indicates, may mean why as in 7.21, meh
l-ti i. Grammatically it may mean what is the signicance of?
In mah-dayim k nq, the construction mh followed by k (that) is
paralleled in 6.11; 7.17; 15.14; Ps. 8.5, mh en k tizkerenn; cf. in the Ras
Shamra texts Gordon UT Krt 39:
mat krt kybky
Who is Krt that he should weep?
13. In illustration of the conception of death as sleep Dhorme aptly cites the
inscription on the bricks of Sennacheribs tomb palace of sleep, tomb of rest,
eternal dwelling of Sennacherib, King of the World, King of Assur.
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14. In im-melm weya re, the preposition is regularly used of comparison in Proverbs, and has probably the same signicance here. Counsellors might be synonymous with kings, as those who, according to royal
ideology in the ancient Near East, are executives of the divine purpose (cf. the
royal titulary in Isa. 9.5 [EVV 6]; 11.2), or it may denote statesmen who share
the knowledge of the kings purpose and mediate it to the community. In the
present context one might think of the statesmen of Egypt, who were favoured
with tombs in the vicinity of the pyramids and other tombs of the Pharaohs.
But this privilege of spectacular burial was not conned to Egypt, as indicated
by the tomb of the brother, that is, trusted minister, of the queen of the
Nabataeans so designated in an inscription at Petra.
If or is a sound reading, meaning literally ruins, it might refer to the
building of monuments, such as tombs, which were subsequently ruins (e.g.
Isa. 58.12; 61.4), where or is the synonymous parallel of mem, or as
those passages in Isaiah and T and V suggest, the building up of ruined or
desert places. Ewald and Stevenson, assuming corruption of MT, understood
the reference to be to the pyramids (Arab. harm), which we consider unlikely,
both on textual grounds and as unattested in Heb., Aram. or Syr. Hlscher and
Fohrer retain MT, but in the same sense as Arab. harm, the verbal root of
which coincides with the regular meaning of Heb. ar (to be ruinous,
decrepit). Olshausen and Daiches (1908: 637ff.) seem nearer the truth in
taking or to mean palaces; so too G.R. Driver (1950d: 349), citing
Ethiopic and S. Arab. mrb (castle), which evidently survived in N. Arab.,
signifying the prestigious quarters of a house, hence a palace. The word in this
sense, extant but evidently rare in Hebrew, is used here probably ad hoc to
suggest double entendre in the style of the poet in Job in palace and ruin. In
possible support of the interpretation of T and V one might cite tombs in
Egypt on the desert edge or in desolate valleys like the Valley of the Kings
near Luxor, in which the rich grave furniture (cf. v. 15) was a notorious
encouragement to tomb-robbing. The context suggests the decay of former
palaces rather than ruins as such or graves on the desert edge.
15. In this context the houses which are lled with gold might be the tombs,
which were called houses of eternity in Egypt and Mesopotamia. This,
however, is not explicit in the text, and it may refer to the treasures of the
kings in their lifetime. Tur-Sinai aptly cites the Aramaic inscription of BarRekub of Shamal (Cooke 1903: 63.10-11), which refers to kings, owners of
silver and gold.
17. rez in the OT means generally agitation, as of the war-horse (39.24)
and of thunder (37.2) and of the agitation to which humans are subject (14.1).
In Job 3.17 the word is used of the agitation the subject causes. This usage is
familiar in Syr. where the cognate verb denotes the wrath of God; cf. Arab.
rujzu(n) in the adaptation of the Syriac Christian tradition in the Quran.
1
146
yei a means exhausted in strength. The verb meaning to weary out

or toil at is well enough attested in the OT, but the participle is used only
here and in Ben Sira 37.12.
18. n denotes the task-master over slaves (Exod. 3.7; 5.14; etc.; Isa. 14.2,
4; Zech. 9.8). The verb, with an Arab. cognate najaa, means to harry or
beat up (game), and is used of the ruler of Abyssinia, the Negus; see below,
on 40.19.
19. h means the same, one and the same; cf. Ps. 102.28; Isa. 41.4; 43.10,
13; 48.12ff.
o was a legal term meaning quit of burdens and specically, as here,
of servitude (e.g. Exod. 21.2, 5).
anyw as distinct from the singular, means usually his Lord as distinct
from his human master. Here it is a plural of majesty or dignity; cf. GKC,
124g, i.
22. On the reading el-al for MT el-l see textual note, adopted by Stevenson, Tur-Sinai, Horst, Fohrer and Pope among modern commentators. Beer,
Hlscher and Tur-Sinai connect gal with the verb glal, to roll, and think of
the cylindrical blocking stone rolling in the slot as at the entrance to the tombs
of the family of Herod the Great at Jerusalem. But the date of this type of
burial is rather late for the Book of Job. gal denotes rather a pile of stones (cf.
gal anm, Josh. 7.24; 8.29; 2 Sam. 18.17), either as marking the grave or as
a protection for the corpse against jackals. In Palestine during the British
Mandate heavy stones were rst piled on the cofn for this purpose before the
grave was lled with earth. Horst emphasizes the preposition el, signifying
the way to the grave, which is a satisfaction to the wretched. This is perhaps
preciose. Dhorme retained MT, rendering They rejoice to jubilation. Perhaps
the original text read gl without the mater lectionis y to suggest the double
entendre gl (joy) and gal (grave-heap), which is demanded by the parallel
a grave in the second colon. The citation of Hos. 9.1 in support of MT el-l
is invalid as this is almost certainly a corruption of al tl.
23. The conception of ones way being diverted recalls 19.8,
He has walled up my way and I cannot pass
And he has set thorns on my path.
The phrase wayyse baa recalls at baa of 1.10. The different sibilant
is to be noted. The verb, which could be Hiphil either of s or sa, but is
probably from s, means to erect a screen, which obstructed or concealed as
well as protected. So baa (about him) signies here obstruction and not
protection as in 1.10.
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24. The couplet, which resumes the theme of Jobs particular misery after the
general reections on the futility of life, reects the conventional language and
imagery of the Plaint of the Sufferer (cf. Ps. 42.4 [EVV 3]). In view of the
usage of lien meaning in the character of, like (4.19; 1 Sam. 1.16), there
is no need to emend with Beer to le (in proportion to).
In lam the more general sense food is to be noted in Hebrew poetry as
regularly in Ugaritic.
25. The verb h (to come) is more common in Aramaic than Hebrew, and
is common in Arab. and Ugaritic. The retention of the nal radical y and the
direct object after this verb is reminiscent of Arab. usage.
26. On rez, here as in v. 17 in the objective sense, see on v. 17.
Job 4 and 5
ELIPHAZS FIRST ADDRESS
After Jobs despairing curse on the day he was born the Dialogue proper
begins with a solemn statement of conventional wisdom. The mild rebuke to
Job (4.2-6) appeals to him as an exponent of traditional wisdom, aiming at the
adjustment of humans to the vicissitudes of life in patience and fortitude. The
well-attested fact of retribution for sin encourages a person to hope that life is
not meaningless, as Job in his anguish had averred, but that under the theodicy
a good person might expect not to be disappointed (vv. 7-11). But the sage is
sufcient of a realist to know and be disturbed by human limitations. The
sages, though professing reason rather than revelation, were still the heirs of
the cultic and prophetic traditions of Israel. Thus Eliphaz shared the realistic
view of Jeremiah (17.9) that the heart is deceitful above all things and
desperately corrupt. When the angels, though executives of God, cannot fully
comprehend the divine plan and purpose in all its scope and may in fact be
reprehensible, so even the best of human beings must still die defective in
wisdom, that is, in the understanding of life and the proper reaction to lifes
circumstances (vv. 12-21b). They must then be prepared to suffer the consequences of their lapses under the ordered government of God, which is
observable in nature and society (5.3-16) and only a fool who has abandoned
the patience and self-discipline practised and counselled by Hebrew wisdom
will expostulate with God and yield to despair (5.3). The purposes of God are
consistent, and positive even in suffering. Indeed suffering may be a mark of
the divine concern (5.17). Therefore the sufferer must take courage, looking to
the ultimate deliverance and divine favour, which the sages study of life
attests (5.17-27).
The section falls into nine strophes of ve units of bicola and tricola (4.2-6,
7-11, 12-16, 17-20b, 21b + 5.2; 5.3-5b, 4.21a, 5.5c; 5.6-7 + 1 + 8-11, 12-16,
17-20, 22-27). This arrangement suggests that 5.10 is possibly a later
expansion (see Commentary ad loc.) and 5.2 also is possibly a gloss on 4.21b
which has come into the text at the wrong place through the attraction of the
word ewl, which is common to 5.2 and 5.3 (see Commentary ad loc.).
The literary types employed in this section are various. Eliphaz opens with
some words of apology and the statement of the grounds for his intromission
in the convention of sapiential or forensic dialectic, which is a general feature
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The Book of Job
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of the opening of the address of Jobs interlocutors and also of Elihu (vv. 3237). The general principle of sin and retribution is stated in the second strophe
(vv. 7-11) in the sapiential tradition in gures which recall Proverbs, though
the unit is not as in most of Proverbs the couplet, but the strophe. In the
following two strophes (vv. 12-16 and 17-20b, 21b + 5.2) this principle is
reiterated in the form of a prophetic oracle, though in the language and
argument e fortiori of wisdom literature. The strophe on the certain discomture of the wicked (5.3-5b, 4.21a, 5.5c) by its description of the wicked as
the fool betrays its prototype in wisdom literature. The sixth strophe (5.6-7,
1, 8-11), from the same literary tradition, states the antithesis of the retribution
of the wicked (vv. 6-7) and the divine vindication of the humble (vv. 8-11),
where the divine nature and activity is described in statements in participial
form characteristic of the Hymn of Praise on the theme of the establishment of
Cosmos by God as King, hence appropriate and evocative of this theme in the
argument of Eliphaz for Gods Order in society. This hymnic form is developed to the same end in the seventh strophe (5.12-16). In these two strophes
the antithesis of the fate of the wicked and the righteous, which is generally
stated in the couplet in the wisdom tradition, as in Proverbs, is stated here at
greater length in the compass of the strophe. Eliphazs address ends in two
strophes (5.17-20 and 22-27) in the true wisdom tradition. The theme is stated
in the aphorism happy is the man whom God corrects in the couplet at v. 17,
which is then developed in a poem on the subject of Gods discipline and
providential care. Repeated instances of this are graphically noted, introduced
by the numerical convention In six strokes of adversityyea in seven (v.
19), which, if not admittedly conned to wisdom literature, was certainly a
favourite macronic device of the sages; cf. Prov. 30.15-17, 18-19, 21-23, 2428, 29-31.
Chapter 4
1.
Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said:
2.
If one took up1 a word with you, could you bear it?
Yet who could refrain from words?
Look, you have instructed the tremulous,2
And strengthened feeble hands.
You would strengthen bowing knees.
But now when it reaches you you cannot bear it,
And when it comes to you you are non-plussed.
Is not your piety your assurance,
Your perfect conduct3 your hope?
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
1
Recall, what man if innocent ever perished,

Or where were the righteous ever destroyed?
For as far as I have seen, those who plough in mischief
And sow trouble reap it.
Job 4 and 5. Eliphazs First Address
150
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21b
5.2.
Wanting the breath of God they perish,

Wanting the afatus of his nostrils they are no more.
The lion may roar and the roarer may cry loudly,
But the teeth of the great lions are done away,
The lion perishes wanting prey,
And the lion-whelps are scattered.
But to me a word came quietly,
Yea, a whisper of it caught my ear,
In intimate thoughts in night-visions
When deep sleep falls upon men.
Terror confronted me and trembling,
And quaking dislocated my bones.
And a breath passed over my face,
The hair of my body bristled up.4
Before me (
) stood,
But I did not recognize his appearance.5
A form was before my eyes,
Silence, then I heard a voice.
Is a man more just than God?
Is a man purer than his maker?
If he does not commit himself wholly to his servants,
And charges even his angels with error,
How much more those who inhabit houses of clay,
Whose foundations are in the dust,
Who are crushed6 as the moth,
Pulverized between morning and evening,
They perish forever without laying it to heart?7
8They die without attaining to wisdom.
For vexation kills the fool,
And the death of the simpleton is passion. 9

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
nissh (put to the test) is a doubtful reading, as is indicated by Aq., Theod.,

Sym. and apparently also V and S, which read weni (so Bttcher, Beer,
Hoffmann, Duhm, Peters, Dhorme, Kissane, Hlscher, Stevenson). nissh means
to tempt, test and not to venture, attempt as is assumed by DriverGray, Horst,
Fohrer and Pope. Hence we read wen.
Reading rm (from r) for MT rabbm; see Commentary ad loc.
The parallelism in this couplet is chiastic, and we should be omitted before tm as a
dittograph after k in tiqwe. The conjunction might have dropped out before
tiqwe by haplography after nal k in kisle in the Old Heb. script.
Reading the Qal tismar (intransitive) as the predicate of aara rather than MT
tesammr (transitive) as the predicate of ra, which is treated as masculine in
v. 15a.
In MT the subject of yaam and antecedent of the pronominal sufx in marh
might be ra, which is treated as masculine in v. 15a, the masculine referring to
the apparition of a personal agency. In this case if MT is correct the short colon in
MT
The Book of Job
6.
7.
8.
9.
v. 16a would include aposeopesis for dramatic effect, but it is more likely that there
was explicit reference to a personal agent, which might have been suppressed
through motives of orthodoxy.
MT yeakkem (they crush them) would signify the indenite subject. S and V
read the passive yeukke.
Reading mm, a verbal noun for MT mm; see Commentary ad loc.
On the arrangement of the text, see Commentary on 4.21.
The couplet 5.2, which does not connect with 5.1 or with 5.3, may have been
displaced to its present position in MT through the incidence of the word ewl in
both verses. After 4.21b it explains the statement that one dies unwittingly (l
eomh) and may be a gloss.
Chapter 5
3.
4.
5.
4.21a
5.5c.
6.
7.
1.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
1
151
I have seen the fool taking root,

And suddenly his homestead was obliterated,1
His sons abandoned helpless,
And crushed in the gate with none to deliver,
His harvest eaten by the hungry;
Men take it away to their own zeriba.2
Is not their abundance plucked from them,3
And the thirsty4 gasp for their wealth?
Nay, mischief does not grow from the earth,
Nor trouble sprout from the ground,
But man is born to trouble
As Reshefs children to soar high.
Call, if there is any to answer you.
Yea, to whom of the holy ones will you turn?
But I would resort to God,
To God would I refer my case,
Who does great things beyond investigation,
Wonders beyond number,
Who gives rain on the face of the earth,
And sends water over the surface of the elds,
Raising5 the lowly on high,
The down-stooping6 are high-established in safety.
He frustrates the devices of the crafty,
And their hands do not effect their plan;
He takes the clever in their cunning,
And the purpose of the subtle is marred by haste;
By day they encounter darkness,
And as at night they grope at high noon;
And he has delivered the ruined man7 from their mouth,
Yea, the poor man from the power of the strong,
And there is hope for the poor,
And iniquity has shut her mouth.
8Happy
the man that God corrects!

Spurn not the discipline of the Almighty,
152
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.

For he makes one smart, but he dresses the wound,
He wounds, but his hands also heal.
In six strokes of adversity he will deliver you,
Yea, in seven shall no harm touch you.
In famine he ransoms you from Death,
And in battle from the power of the sword;
When slander is at large9 you will be hidden,
And you will have no fear of calumny when it comes.
At destruction and famine you will laugh,
Yea, you will have no fear of the wild beasts,
And the weeds of the eld will be bought into concord with you.
And you will be assured that your tent is safe,
And will visit your fold and nd nothing amiss.
And you will know your progeny numerous,
And your issue like the grass of the earth;
You will come in full health to the grave,
As a pile of sheaves is brought up to the threshing-oor in its season.
Lo, this we have searched out; it is true.
Hear it and know it for yourself.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
Reading yqa, perhaps in scriptio defectiva, from a root cognate with Arab.
waqaba (to be obliterated, as the sun in eclipse) or to subside, for MT eqq,
from qa (to curse). See Commentary ad loc.
Reading meinnm for MT miinnm. See Commentary ad loc.
The colon is displaced from v. 21a. See Introduction to chs. 45 and Commentary
on 4.21.
Reading emm for MT ammm.
Reading ham with LXX and V for MT lm according to the participial usage
characteristic of the Hymn of Praise in vv. 9, 10, 12, 13.
Reading qem for MT qerm as suggested by the parallelism. See Commentary
ad loc.
Reading the Hophal participle moor for MT mere. See Commentary ad loc.
Omitting hinnh metri causa.
LXX, S and V read from the scourge and one Hebrew MT reads mi. MT be
may retain the Canaanite usage of be meaning from, as in the Ras Shamra texts,
though the literary inuence of Canaanite poetry is most marked in mythological
references in the Book of Job. But the consonants of MT may be retained, reading
be halln (when slander is at large). See Commentary ad loc.
2. On the reading n for MT nissh see textual note. The perfect is conditional.
3. Tur-Sinai suggests that rabbm is a Masoretic misunderstanding of a participle rm from r, cognate with Arab. rba, yarbu (to take fright, be
1
The Book of Job
153
confounded). The parallel with yayim rt (weak hands), however,

indicates the verb r is rather cognate with Akk. rbu (quaking). The
strengthening of the weak (lit. relaxed) hands and the stumbling, or bowing,
knees was an ideal of the restoration from Exile in Isa. 35.3-4 in language
which practically repeats the passage in Job. The phrase to relax the hands,
that is, to enervate, is familiar in the OT and denotes pacist activity in the
Lachish Letters (IV, 6) from the end of the Judaean monarchy.
ysar in Qal or Piel means to discipline, admonish, chasten, implying
always a positive end and the mind of authority. The parallel with teazzq
(you have strengthened) makes Ehrlichs proposed reading yissat (you
have supported) at least feasible.
4. In milln the Aram. plural is to be noted, occurring, as Dhorme has pointed
out, thirteen times in Job as against ten times when it is millm, surely
evidence of Aram. inuence in the Book.
5. The verb lh means regularly in Hebrew to be weary, exhausted, hence
unable, and may have this meaning here. In Ugaritic it means to be strong;
cf. the title of Baal aliyn (the mighty). The usual sense in Hebrew to be
weary means to have exhausted ones strength.
The root na, meaning to reach, is usually used in the Hiphil in Classical Hebrew, but is found in the Qal in Isa. 16.8; Jer. 4.10; 48.32; Mic. 1.9.
6. Dhorme notes yirh (fear) with the implication fear of God as a
peculiarity of the statements of Eliphaz (cf. 15.4; 22.4). It is the regular
Hebrew for piety.
8. kaaer r (For as I have seen), lit. according to what I have seen, sc.
experienced, is particularly frequent in Ecclesiastes in the sages appeal to
empirical fact. The agricultural gure of ploughing in mischief (wen) and
reaping trouble recalls Prov. 22.8 and, at greater length, Hos. 10.13. Ploughing mischief may be a pregnant expression for ploughing the ground for
mischief, but it probably refers to ploughing in mischief as seed, which the
Arabs in Palestine still sow on the surface and then plough in with their
shallow plough (Dalman 1932: II, 184).
9. The couplet may be intentionally ambiguous. min may be privative, as in
our translation, referring to the animation of humans by the breath of the
Creator (Gen. 2.7), on which they totally depend. The preposition may, on the
other hand, be causative, by the breath of God they perish Not only the
preposition but also app is ambiguous, meaning his nostril or his anger.
The latter sense is more congruous with the preceding couplet, the former with
what follows, which emphasizes the perishing lion-cubs bereft of their
provider.
1
154
10f. The relevance of this passage is not immediately obvious, and it has been
rejected as not original (Duhm), as a marginal note which has crept into the
text (Ball) or a secondary addition by a redactor (Strahan). Tur-Sinai (1957:
88-91) regarded it as an exclamation by Eliphaz, animadverting on Jobs
outburst in ch. 3: A lions roaring: crying of a great beast: (gnashing of) the
teeth of lions that roam about, of a lion straying without prey, of a lions
whelps scattered abroad. Whether the passage refers to Job or not, the
mention of lions reects the gurative reference to the impious who doubt the
Order of God in the Plaint of the Sufferer in the Psalms (7.3 [EVV 2]; 22.14
[EVV 13]) or brutes who show their teeth at the sufferer (Ps. 35.17 [EVV 16]).
On this interpretation, which we prefer, the passage may well apply to the
discomture of the wicked in vv. 8f., with a warning to Job to curb his
outspoken resentment, which is going to nd expression in the Dialogue in his
criticism of the current doctrine of the theodicy.
10. nitt (pausal form) has been taken as an Aram. form of the Niphal of the
Classical Hebrew na (to break down), which would suit teeth admirably,
but would leave roar and voice without a predicate. Israel Eitan (1939:
11ff.) proposed that the verb is a cognate of Ethiopic nataa (to ee, hence
to cease, or disappear); so also Fohrer. The synonyms for lion, aryeh,
aal, ker, layi and l, make translation impossible without preciosity,
as in the innumerable appellations of the camel at various stages of the development of either sex in Arab. poetry. ker, however, possibly refers to the size
of the lion, as the word, denoting a great sea-monster in Ezek. 32.2, indicates
(so Tur-Sinai).
12. yegunna, here came secretly, or furtively, has a parallel in 2 Sam. 19.4,
and the people came furtively into the city, where the Hithpael of the verb is
used.
eme, known in Hebrew only here and in 26.14 and in the form imh in
Exod. 32.25, where the sense seems to be malicious rumour, is taken by S
and T and by rabbinic commentators as a trie, as possibly in 26.14, but Sym
and V render a whisper, which suggests that it is probably a cognate of Arab.
amia, to speak rapidly, or indistinctly (so Hlscher, Horst).
13. eippm is found in the OT only here and at 20.2 and is variously rendered
in the ancient versions, for example, thoughts (T), fear (LXX, Sym., V),
alternation (Aq.), sleep (S). No feasible cognate has been suggested for
eippm, which we take as a dialectic variant of seippm found in 1 Kgs 18.21,
where it means two minds (lit. forking of a branch); cf. the variants /s,
/s and aq/saq. This indicates that thoughts (T) is nearest the
meaning, which we render diverging thoughts; cf. 20.2, which we render
racking thoughts. Sleep, according to Fohrer (1989: 142f.), indicates the
1
The Book of Job
155
passive attitude conducive to receptivity when the subjective element is

minimized. Eliphazs terror emphasizes the reaction of the sage to revelation
beyond the normal insights of Hebrew wisdom, though of course exaggerated.
14. qeran is a byform of qrh (to light upon, confront). The subject of
hi (made to tremble or dislocated) is usually taken as paa (terror),
with r amay (all [lit. the abundance of] my bones) as object. MT r,
however, may be vocalized as r, a cognate of Akk. rbu (quaking) as the
subject of hi; cf. G.R. Driver (1955: 73) (and quaking shook my bones).
The verb pa is taken as cognate with Arab. faaa (to wound in the
thigh, II form, to separate), hence (of bones) to dislocate. The word-play
between this verb and paa (fear) in v. 14a is a feature of the style of the
author of the Book of Job.
15. la (to pass by) is used of a storm-wind in Isa. 21.1. ra is ambiguous. Noticing that the predicate is masculine singular, Duhm took ra to
signify a spiritual presence. But ra in Hebrew most normally denotes wind,
which may be the accompaniment of the advent of God, who presumably
speaks in the voice in vv. 17-21. The presence of God, which the word
symbolizes, may account for the masculine singular of the verb, though ra
is used with the masculine of the predicate in Exod. 10.13, where it means a
wind.
On the reading tismar (intransitive), meaning to bristle up, so used as a
predicate of br in Ps. 119.120, see textual note.
16. The arrangement of the passage in bicola suggests that part of a colon has
been lost, including the more explicit subject of yaam, which is probably
the antecedent of the pronominal sufx in marh (see textual note). The
mention of the apparition (temnh) indicates a supernatural representative of
God and not God himself in direct revelation. The whole passage is reminiscent of the revelation to Elijah at Horeb (1 Kgs 19.12), itself reecting the
revelation to Moses at the sacred mountain, particularly the tradition that
Moses not only spoke with God face to face, but saw his form (temnh,
Num. 12.8), a tradition which may be implied in Deut. 4.12-15, which states
that the people as distinct from Moses did not see the temnh of God, and in
Ps. 17.15, where the psalmist declares that he shall see the face of God and be
satised with his temnh. The word may thus denote the exceptionally sure
apprehension of the presence of God on the part of rare persons of dedication
and spiritual susceptibility. Eliphaz may thus be claiming authority for his
statement, as Lvque (1970: 261) proposes.
Silence and a voice (demmh wql) may be a hendiadys, but demmh
may stand pointedly in isolation to indicate the silence, after which the
message was heard, as in 1 Kgs 19.12.
1
156
18. hn should probably be rendered if, as Aram. in (so LXX). yaamn
signies reliance upon, implying commitment of ones secrets and interests to
the person trusted. The thought is repeated with reference to the holy ones
(sc. angels) in 15.15.
The angels of God means lit. his messengers. This was taken by T as the
prophets, but in the Book of Job one naturally thinks of heavenly agents as
those in the divine court in the Prologue. More particularly the passage recalls
the saints of the Lord in Ben Sira, whose immeasurable inferiority to God
prevents them from sharing his knowledge of all the wonders of creation (Ben
Sira 42.17).
toholh is variously rendered in the versions as crookedness (LXX),
depravity (Jerome, V, T), astonishment (S), and vanity (Sym., Theod.).
The word, if MT is sound, would be a hapax legomenon, a verbal noun from a
root cognate with Arab. wahila (to commit error), which has an Ethiopic
cognate to wander. So Pope.
19. a is abbreviated from a-k (how much less or how much more); cf.
9.14; 25.6. Houses of clay are bodies of humans created from the earth
(amh, cf. Gen. 2.6 [J]) or potters clay (cf. 10.9; 33.6) and guratively Isa.
64.7 (EVV 8).
On the reading yeukke for MT yeakkem, assuming dittography of the
nal w mistaken for m in the Old Hebraic script, see textual note.
In lien (like a moth, after LXX and V) T and S have misunderstood
this sense of the preposition, on which see on 3.24.
20. From morning till evening indicates not continuous afiction but the
ephemeral nature of the moth.
yukkatt means lit. are reduced to pieces. In view of the gure crushed to
powder, pulverized would be a better translation of the verb ka; cf. Deut.
9.21, and the pulverization of the Golden Calf. The form yukkatt is to be
noticed as Aramaic or at least as an Aramaizing form of the Hophal.
miel mm, if correct, assumes the ellipse of l (heart, understanding).
If this is so, the Hiphil rather than the Qal is suspicious. Pope after Dahood
(1962: 55) suggests that the original text may have read mibbelm m
(without repute), the enclitic that reinforces the preposition min being
mistaken for the preformative of the Hiphil participle in MT mm written in
scriptio defectiva, which is feasible. LXX reads without their being able to
help themselves, which suggests mibbel mm lhem nea (so Beer, Stevenson). But this overloads the metre, and the original of LXX may be mibbel
ma, without any being able to deliver them (so Merx, Graetz, Houtsma,
Dhorme). Here, however, it is unlikely that such a distinctive letter in the
context as ayin should have dropped out at any stage of the script. Tur-Sinai
makes the feasible suggestion that MT mm is an Aramaic innitive construct
(Qal with the force of a verbal noun; so Horst, who renders unbeachtet).
1
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21. On the view that v. 21a is displaced from before 5.5c, see Introduction to
chs. 45. The transposition of v. 21a to what we believe to be its original
position leaves v. 19c parallel to v. 20a, and v. 20b parallel to v. 21b. This
supports Tur-Sinais interpretation of v. 20b as against the various emendations
noted above. Here, however, it is important to note that mm and omh are
not passive, as Horst assumed, but active. This is important in view of the
arrangement of the text in the sequel, which is a matter of notorious difculty.
Commentators differ in the interpretation of the phrase wel eokmh
which is ambiguous, since okmh signies either the Creators objective plan
and purpose in all things, as in Job 28 and Proverbs 8, or the subjective
intelligence or prudence and practical wisdom in the emergencies of life. Horst
proposed that it meant that humans die without any intelligent purpose being
observable, but that was not in accordance with the orthodoxy of Eliphaz.
Budde, Hlscher and Fohrer understood it to mean without knowing how.
Ehrlich and Stevenson, after LXX, rendered for lack of wisdom, which can
scarcely be the meaning in view of death as the common and inevitable fate of
all humans. Gray and Driver explain the phrase as without having realized the
moral limitations of human nature. In the context of his reply to Jobs petulance, Eliphaz, we think, is stating that for lack of self-discipline of wisdom to
assimilate the experience of life (v. 20b) and to adjust themselves patiently to
circumstances, human beings induce their own destruction by their angry
rebellion against circumstances (5.2), which Job has evinced in his cursing of
his existence in ch. 3. Note that 5.1, which makes no sense in its position in
MT, is displaced from before 5.8 (so Dhorme). See Commentary on Chapter 5.
2. In leewl, le is the nota accusativa, familiar in later Aramaic, but also
known in earlier passages in the OT, for example, 2 Sam. 3.30, where it may
be a vestige of Old Aramaic. kaa is an orthographic variant of regular kaas,
signifying the emotional strain of resentment with the implication of frustration, which is specically associated with the fool (ewl), which signies also
the wicked in Prov. 27.3.
qinh, which usually denotes exclusive and intolerant devotion, in this
context denotes rather the overt self-commitment of the simpleton (peh) who
is not sufciently subtle to conceal or restrain his feelings.
3. Noting rightly that the Piel of r may mean to eradicate as well as to take
root, Hoffmann interpreted the passage in the former sense, reading the Pual
participle mer. Dhorme notes that the sudden (pim) destruction of the
wicked in the second colon indicates the opposite. Actually the Hiphil
expresses the denominative sense to take root.
158
If with Dhorme we take weqq as and I cursed from qa, after Aq.
and V., this would indicate the endorsement of the divine displeasure by a
curse, as for instance the punctilio which the Arabs of Jerusalem used to
observe in cursing the reputed tomb of Absalom whenever they passed it. This
interpretation is excluded by the adverb pim. The reading of the verb,
however, is in doubt as indicated by the variations in the versions, for
example, his livelihood is eaten up (LXX), his abode has perished (S). The
noun nweh is attested in v. 24 and 18.15 as abode or the like. More particularly in Jer. 33.12 it denotes the folds and settlements of shepherds. An Akk.
cognate denotes encampments in the Alalakh Tablets (Wiseman 1953: 10).
Various emendations have been proposed for MT weqq, for example,
werq, and (his dwelling) rotted (Merx, Bickell, Siegfried, Hlscher), or
wayyirqa (Duhm, Ehrlich, Stevenson, Weiser, Fohrer), with the same meaning. The emendation of Baumgrtel wayyqer (was eradicated), which is
accepted by Horst, is too far removed from the consonants of MT. Perhaps
wayyqa should be read, the verb being cognate with Arab. waqaba (to
be effaced or to subside); cf. Israel Eitans proposal (1939: 9-23) that
wayyqa should be read, derived from a verb q cognate with Arab. qba,
the II form of which means to eradicate. An interesting proposal is that of
J.J. Slotki (1931: 288) that the consonants of T may be arranged without
emendation to read weaqq benwh (and the wild goat is in his household), taking aqq as wild goat mentioned in Deut. 14.5. But this interpretation also is practically ruled out by the adverb pim (suddenly).
4. The gate is the place of public justice; cf. Prov. 22.22, Do not crush the
poor in the gate (al-teakk n baar), where the same verb is used as
in the present passage. The locus classicus for justice and the vindication of
the poor in the gate is Ruth 4.1-11.
5. For MT aer qer r yl (whose harvest the hungry eats) LXX
reads, with too abrupt a change of subject, aer qer r yl (that
which they have reaped the hungry shall eat), understanding his sons as
subject.
In v. 5b and c the versions are at variance and give no help beyond attesting
MT with only slight variation. miinnm at rst sight suggests from the
thorns, or possibly the place of thorns, though this is not the rendering of
any of the versions. The former meaning seems to be contradicted by the
preposition el (to), but possibly the original reading was lemiinnm, with le
signifying from as in Ugaritic, being reinforced by min; cf. mille. The
meaning would be that the hungry took the corn of the wicked from the thorns
which, like a zeriba, were used, as still among the Arab peasants, to protect
the grain from beasts on the threshing-oor until it is brought into storage.
Perhaps el-meinnm (to their own zeriba) may be read as in our translation.
G.R. Driver proposes to overcome the difculty of MT el-miinnm by taking
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The Book of Job
159
el as l (the strong) from the root l. Tur-Sinai proposes to read lm

(their strength is dearth), taking lam (lit. strength, so possessions) as
parallel to lm. l, however, is not attested in the sense of wealth. For his
reading annm Tur-Sinai cites the participle enun (shrivelled), used of
ears of corn in Pharaohs dream in Gen. 41.23.
The third colon, v. 5c, unless this a case of a tricolon punctuating a passage
arranged in bicola to indicate the end of the passage according to sense, is
suspect, implying an omission or a displacement of a colon, which is possibly
to be found at 4.21a, Is not their abundance wrested from them, as Dhorme
proposed.
The ancient versions (Aq., Sym., V; cf. S) are unanimous in suggesting that
ammm is a corruption of an original emm (thirsty). This involves the
reading wea, possibly written in scriptio defectiva. The verb a,
rendered by Hlscher snap after, means to pant after, hence eagerly desire.
For ayil a concrete substance such as harvest in v. 5a has been suggested,
for example, alm, their milk (Hoffmann, Beer, Tur-Sinai), or allm,
their vinegar (Beer), but ayil is well attested in the sense of substance or
wealth; cf. 20.15, though admittedly after emm some liquid would be
expected.
6. Here the force of k is corroborative. ya has the specic sense grow out;
cf. ee (growth).
7. Commentators differ in reading ywld as the Niphal as in MT and the ancient
versions (Merx, Dillmann, Bickell, G.B. Gray, Ball, Stevenson, Weiser, Horst,
Fohrer, Pope, J.C.L. Gibson) or Hiphil yl, begets (Graetz, Beer, Duhm,
Dhorme, Hlscher, Mowinckel, Terrien). Both are possible in the context. The
latter might claim the support of Eliphazs statement in 4.8 that humans
plough in mischief (wen), and sow trouble (ml), and more particularly the
statement in Ps. 7.15 (EVV 14) that humans conceive mischief (wen) and
bring forth falsehood (weyla eqer); cf. Job 15.35, and especially Isa. 59.4,
where humans conceive trouble and beget mischief (hr ml wehl
wen). In this case le in leml would be the nota accusativi as in Aramaic.
But the comparison with the young eagles or vultures born to soar high
(understanding the imperfect yabh as the verb in a nal clause asyndetically
after the verb implied in yiwwl as in Ugaritic poetry) in our opinion supports MT yiwwl, signifying that humans are born to trouble. J.C.L. Gibson
(pp. 46ff.) understands this to indicate a decree of sympathy on Eliphazs part
for Job as heir to the burden of humankind after the fall of Adam, reecting
specically Gen. 3.17-19. In any case, though the entail of Adams sin might
mitigate that of Job, which Eliphaz assumes, Job is not exonerated from a
degree of responsibility for the accumulation of trouble in society, particularly
in his readiness to venture more than a mortal ought, in pressing his case with
the Almighty.
1
160
The verb suggests that ben ree are birds, and so the phrase is taken in
all the versions except T, where it is variously rendered as sons of demons or
sparks, whence EVV. In support of the interpretation as birds Dhorme
suggests that, as Pss. 76.4 (EVV 3), 78.48 and Song 8.6 indicate, ree means
lightning, with which he associated the eagle. Deuteronomy 32.24 and Hab.
3.5, incidentally, do not support this interpretation, since there ree is parallel
to plague, and is therefore the personication of plague or death en masse,
which was the province of the Canaanite god Reeph, now well known in this
capacity in the Ras Shamra texts (e.g. Gordon, UT Krt 18). It is a remarkable
fact that in Deut. 32.24 Targum Onkelos renders ree as birds and Ben Sira
43.14, 17, LXX and V so render the same word, neither, however, specifying
eagles or vultures, which none of the versions does in Job 5.7b. LXX in fact
renders ree as vulture, which has suggested the emendation neer, which is
graphically feasible. In this case, however, the versions would almost certainly
have been specic. We seem to be driven back on the interpretation of ree as
a forgotten relic of Canaanite mythology. Reeph was a god who slew humans
in mass by war or plague, and is known from a mythological fragment from
Ras Shamra as Lord of the Arrow (bl ) (RS 15.134.3; Virolleaud 1957:
3ff.). Thus the sons of Reeph may be arrows, the normal parabolic ight of
which may be described. But in view of the association of Reeph with mass
death the sons of Reeph are probably the vultures (where the body is there
will the vultures gather). Their high ight enables them to locate their carrion
with speed that appears uncanny (39.27-29). Horst suggestively cites the
designation rp prm in Azitawadds inscription from Karatepe (Donner and
Rllig 1962: no. 26 A, II, 10-11), where prm may mean birds, or perhaps
more specically birds of prey, lit. taloned birds; cf. ippr in Ezek. 39.4.
Tur-Sinai comes near to this interpretation, but in the writers opinion needlessly identies the Reeph-birds with the Classical harpies.
5.1. This verse is displaced in MT from before v. 8, to which it is the appropriate introduction, not being relevant in its position in MT, where the theme is
the retribution of the fool.
The identity of qem in this context is apparently the angels who might
intercede for the sufferer, a conception which we encounter again in the
speeches of Elihu and which is implied per contra by the ofce of the n as
public prosecutor among the divine beings (ben elhm) in the Prologue.
The usage and theological background recalls Zech. 14.5 (late postexilic) and
Dan. 8.13 (second century BCE). Buttenwieser (1922: 165-67), however, proposes that dead ancestors, notable possessors of divine favour and so effective
intercessors, like the Arab. wl, are denoted. In support he cites Saadyah, who
renders gl in Job 19.25 as wl, and Isa. 63.16:
You are our father;
Abraham does not care for us,
Nor does Israel acknowledge us.
1
The Book of Job
161
You are our father,

Our Vindicator (gl) has been your name
From time immemorial.
He takes elhm in this sense in Isa. 8.19; cf. 1 Sam. 28.13, where it denotes
the dead Samuel. The rhetorical question may, however, rather reect the
limitations of the holy ones, the angels of 4.18.
8. This is the natural sequel and contrast to 5.1.
derh, familiar in the phrase al-dira (according to the fashion of), as
distinct from dr (word), is a forensic or philosophic term denoting case.
9. Here a participle introduces a Hymn of Praise (vv. 9-16), which is sustained
by references in the same style and form to praiseworthy acts of God. This
form was familiar in psalms celebrating the providence of God in nature,
history and society in the liturgy of the New Year festival and is cited here
because of its traditional association with this theme and its variations in the
argument of Eliphaz (see above, pp. 49-50). This is also the explanation of
what are generally described as doxologies in Amos 4.13; 5.8; 8.8; 9.5ff.,
which, like the chorus of a Greek tragedy, emphasize the main philosophic
theme. The use of this hymnic excerpt results in a strophe longer than usual in
the context.
nil denotes manifestations of Gods immediate activity, which, by its
very nature, dees human explanation by secondary causes.
10. The mention of the rain and of the distribution of water as the rst instance
of Gods providence reects the Canaanite origin of the liturgy of the great
autumn festival with its theme of the victory of God over the forces of Chaos
(J. Gray 1956; 1961). In Canaan this was the exploit of Baal-Hadad, who was
manifest in the vital rains and storms of winter. In the Canaanite text celebrating his victory over the power of Chaos represented by the unruly Sea-andRiver, which results signicantly in the establishment of his kingship (Gordon
UT 68), Baal is said to drag his defeated adversary away and disperse Sea
(yt ym), thereby, we claim, distributing the ood for the good of the land (cf.
Ps. 104.6ff.). The verb la is used of distributing water in an irrigation
channel, la (Isa. 8.6).
The elds (), lit. places outside, that is, outside the defensive walls
of the settlement (Dhorme), is seldom found, but from Ps. 114.13 and Prov.
8.26 its meaning is not in doubt.
11. The operation of God in raising the humble and abasing the haughty is the
theme also of Ps. 138.6 and 1 Sam. 2.7; cf. the emphasis on the humbling of
the haughty in Isa. 2.9, 11-17 in consequence of the epiphany of God as king
(Isa. 2.10, 19, 21).
1
162
In v. 11a ham should probably be read as suggested by LXX and V in

keeping with the participial expression of Gods great works in vv. 9-13.
Those who mourn is a paraphrase of those who go black (MT qerm),
either in sack-cloth or with blackened or unwashed faces, as a rite of separation in mourning (cf. Pss. 35.14; 38.7 [EVV 6]; 42.10 [EVV 9] etc.), but in the
context this may be a scribal corruption of qem, those who are bowed
down; cf. Gen. 24.26; Exod. 4.31; 12.27; 34.8; etc. (so Peters, Tur-Sinai,
Beer, Stevenson, after S).
12. Success is probably a secondary meaning of tiyyh, which is demonstrated by Hebrew wisdom literature to be generally parallel to wisdom
(omh, Job 11.6; Prov. 2.7) or counsel h (Job 26.3; Prov. 8.14), and
foresight (mezimmh, Prov. 3.21). Hence the meaning effective wisdom is
proposed (DriverGray 1921: 30-32), and in the present passage plan may be
the meaning (so Peake, Dhorme, Hlscher). The word is also parallel to help
(ezrh, 6.13) and strength (z, 12.16) where success may be the meaning
(so Stevenson, Horst). The parallel mae in the present passage suggests
that the meaning here is plan, with, however, the implication of the plan
realized, or effective.
13. nitlm means complicated, lit. plaited or twisted as a rope. h
means counsel or plan, again with the implication of the plan carried
through to an effective conclusion, which in this case is frustrated through
premature haste (nimhrh).
14. Groping (yemaeu) at noon-day reects the elaboration of the curse of
those that contravene the divine commandments in the context of the
conclusion of the Covenant-sacrament in Deut. 28.29. This verb would suggest
a synonym in the parallel colon, and Tur-Sinai suggests that pa may be a
metathetic cognate of Syr. gea. But pa in its usual sense of encounter
has already the implication of stumbling upon, which is a sufciently apt
parallel to ma.
15. In v. 15a a parallel to eyn (needy) is demanded. The simplest solution
would seem to be to vocalize MT mare as moor, the ruined one (so
Michaelis, Ewald, Friedrich Delitzsch, Dhorme, Terrien), thus respecting the
consonants of MT which are attested by all the ancient versions. For the gure
of the oppressor devouring the aficted, cf. Hab. 3.14; Prov. 30.14. This obviates emendations, of which the nearest to MT are that of Stevenson wayya
meuyy mipphem (and he rescued a condemned man from their mouth)
and that of Horst wayya meere mu (and he rescued a man from the
sword).
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163
16. MT lth is attested in Ps. 92.16 in the Qere lh or probably

awlh, explained by Dhorme as a poetic form of awlh on the analogy of
h, weariness (10.22) with a similar shift of diphthong to a long vowel
and the feminine ending in -h. Stop for qeh perhaps gives the wrong
impression. The verb means to draw together (cf. Arab. qafaa), hence to
shut by clamping the lips together; cf. Isa. 52.15, of the powers of the world
who desist from speaking against the Servant of Yahweh.
17. On omission of hinneh metri causa, with Merx, Dillmann, Beer, Duhm,
Ball, Peters, Hlscher and Stevenson, see textual note. So far as sense is concerned the word might be retained as an emphatic enclitic; cf. Arab. inna (so
Dhorme, Horst). ha is a forensic term, to bring a persons guilt home to
one, so in general to reprove (6.25, 26; 32.12; 40.2). The emphasis sometimes falls on the argument for this purpose (13.15) and sometimes on the
result, correction, as here and at 13.10; 22.4; 33.19. As implying impartial
scrutiny of merits and demerits the verb may also denote arbitration between
two parties (9.33; 16.21). The parallel ysar, the root of msr, denotes rather
correction or discipline. Here occurs the rst of the 31 incidences of
adday, generally rendered the Almighty, in Job. l adday is the specic
name of God in the patriarchal narratives in P (cf. Ezek. 10.5, 4), but may
reect earlier usage (cf. Gen. 43.14 [E] and possibly 49.12 [J] after LXX and
the Samaritan Pentateuch). adday has been thought to be connected with the
Akk. and Aram. root to pour, indicating God as the giver of rain or with Akk.
adu (mountain); cf. the rock as a divine appellative in Deut. 32.4; etc. A
connection with Arab. adda (to be strong) has also been suggested. The
connection with Akk. adu seems probable, if still not certain. The Rabbinical
explanation He who is sufcient (Heb. a-day) is an etymological tour de
force, a theologoumenon rather than serious etymology, and is not seriously to
be considered.
In keeping with the universalistic theme of wisdom, the divine name
Yahweh, the God of Israel, is conned to the prologue and epilogue to Job and
to the few prose passages elsewhere in the book. The names adday and l or
elah are preferred as characteristic of the patriarchal age according to the P
tradition and in accordance with the patriarchal setting in which the book is
cast. The term elah (singular of elhm) is used regularly in Job with l and
adday, perhaps to emphasize the unity of God. Dhorme (p. xl) suggests that
elah is an Edomite word, in support of which he cites the use in the psalm in
Hab. 3.3, where God is associated with Teman in the vicinity of Edom, but
here the choice of elah may have been dictated by metric considerations.
l in Amorite theophoric names from the second millennium BCE and in
the Ras Shamra texts is both a generic term god and the name of the Amorite
and Canaanite high god, known very explicitly from the Ras Shamra texts of
164
the fourteenth century BCE as the senior god of the Canaanite pantheon, the
nal authority in all matters in nature and society, but more specically interested in society (J. Gray 1966). The signicance of the Canaanite conception
of El for the development of the conception of Yahweh in Israel cannot be
overestimated, as Eissfeldt has emphasized (1956: 37), He (sc. Yahweh)
received from him (sc. El) the impetus to an evolution which meant the
supplementation of the traits originally belonging to hima dangerous and
bizarre character and jealous vehemenceby the qualities of discretion, and
wisdom, moderation and patience, forbearance and mercy; cf. Fohrer (1953:
cols. 196-97), who also sees in the character of El in the Ras Shamra texts the
signs of a monotheistic tendency in Ugarit.
19. In view of the verb yale (he will deliver you), be r may mean
from six troubles, be meaning from as well as in in Ugaritic; cf. Beer,
Duhm, who conjectured min for MT be, but this need not be so, as the parallel
colon indicates, where be indicates the circumstances in which the person will
experience Gods deliverance. The numerical climax to indicate repetition or an
indenite number is familiar in Hebrew and Ugaritic poetry; cf. Prov. 6.16,
There are six things that Yahweh hates,
Yea, seven that he himself abhors,
and in the Ras Shamra text Gordon UT 51.III.17-18:

There are two sacrices that Baal detests,
Three (detested by) Him who Mounts the clouds
20. pe is the declaratory perfect, emphasizing the certainty of the divine
action proclaimed, particularly common in prophetic utterance, and sometimes
called the prophetic perfect. The verb ph, with an Arab. cognate, denotes
ransom, a familiar practice in tribal warfare raids, in which the blood-feud
imposed an economy of life. From death may either denote ransom so that
one should not be put to death, or it may denote a personication of death, a
reection, of the anthropomorphic gure of Death and Sterility, the archenemy of the life-giving Baal in the Canaanite mythology known in the Ras
Shamra texts.
21. be ln might be another case of be meaning from as in v. 19. The
common translation is scourge of the tongue, but Tur-Sinai after Saadya
takes as to roam; cf. in 1.4; 2.2. He might have cited Ps. 73.9,
lenm tihala bre (RSV And their tongue struts about in the earth) in
support of this interpretation, which accords better with the verb you shall be
hidden and preserves the parallelism with k y (calumny when it
comes). ln (lit. tongue) has probably the pregnant sense calumny here;
cf. the denominative verb lan in Ps. 101.5; Prov. 30.10, with cognates with
this sense in Arabic and Ugaritic (e.g. Gordon UT 2 Aqht VI.51). The word
1
The Book of Job
165
articulated in malice or curse was dreaded as having a potent and palpable

force; cf. qellh nimree in 1 Kgs 2.8, a curse infected with disease, a
crippling curse.
The apparent repetition of in vv. 21 and 22 indicates, as usual in such
cases in Job, a word-play with homonyms. Here with an Arab. cognate
comes rst and the Hebrew homonym (destruction) second, the order
being usually the other way round. The parallelism with ln indicates
that the rst o is the Arab. awdu(n), blackness, that is, denigration; cf.
awwada wajhahu (he blackened his face, i.e. calumniated him).
22. kn (famine) is an Aram. synonym of Heb. rb (v. 20).
al-tr is usually taken as jussive in prohibition, which is explained (GKC,
109b) as the statement of a conviction that something cannot, or may not,
happen. Actually al is found with the imperfect indicative in the Ras Shamra
texts, and this may be a vestige of the poetic diction of Canaan in Hebrew
literature; cf. 20.17; 40.32; Ps. 121.3.
The menace of wild beasts, such as gazelles, to crops and predatory beasts
such as hyenas to ocks and even to human life, was real in the Hejaz, and
even till recently in Palestine, where deep ravines, rocks and scrubland and
semi-desert regions adjacent to the settled land harboured such creatures.
23. In the context referring to such natural enemies as famine, wild beasts and
weeds it is highly unlikely that in the stones of the eld there should be any
reference to boundary stones. The reference is rather to stones which mar the
good land for cultivation either as outcrops of rock or as stony patches (Mt.
13.5) (so Dhorme), or perhaps rock-falls or stones washed over good land by
ood or perhaps dry-stone terrace walls washed out by oods. The reading
an haeh (lords of the eld, i.e. local eld-spirits) is suggested by K.
Kohler, in support of which view Buttenwieser (1922: 170) cites Doughty
(1926: I, 177), Many have sown here, and awhile, the Arabs told me, they
fared well, but always in the reaping time there has died some one of them. A
hidden mischief they think to be in all this soil once subverted by divine
judgments, that it may never be tilled again or inhabited. Malignity of the soil
is otherwise ascribed by the people of Arabia to the ground-demons, jn, ahlu
l-ard or earth-Folk. The natural nuisances in the context, however, support
MT. The marring of cultivable land by stones is noted in war (2 Kgs 3.19, 25),
and their removal and use in terracing is a constant and necessary occupation
among the hills of Palestine (Isa. 5.2). We accept G.R. Drivers suggestion that
ayya haeh in v. 23b means not beasts of the eld, but weeds of the
eld, Adams natural enemies after the Fall (Gen. 2.18 [J]) which by Gods
grace should be brought into concord with humankind (holemh, a form
which occurs only here). On Drivers interpretation ayya is cognate with
Arab. ayyu(n) (cultivated plants or weeds).
1
166
The repetition of haeh is suspect unless, according to the fondness of

the writer of Job for word-play, the one represents the familiar Hebrew and the
other a cognate less familiar in Hebrew. Here we suggest that the former is
Arabic suday (forsaken, useless), hence our rendering:
And the weeds of the eld will be brought into concord with you.
24. MT lmohole is suspect. We should expect either the noun lm with
a preposition (so evidently read by LXXA and Jerome) or a stative verb lm,
which LXX evidently read. The same problem is raised in 21.9, btthem
lm, where LXX, V and possibly also S read the verb lem, indicating
perhaps metathesis of w and m, which closely resemble each other in the Old
Hebrew script. But Dhorme cites other instances where lm is apparently
used as a predicate after the subject, for example, Gen. 43.27; 1 Sam. 25.6; 2
Sam. 20.9. If these like the present passage are not simply errors of dittography in the Old Hebrew script, lm may be the participle of a stative verb
lm, a byform of the more familiar lm (to be whole), specically
denoting be at peace. Alternatively MT lm in those passages may be
lm (at ease), the noun l with the afformative m which is used as a
substitute for, or to supplement, the preposition in Akkadian and Ugaritic,
having an adverbial force, as in Heb. ymm, pim, omnm and innm. See
further on 21.9.
As hel, nweh suggests the desert, not necessarily literally but as a relic of
nomadic antecedents, like so much in Hebrew. nweh is the camp and sheepfolds, or corrals, of shepherds on the desert edge (e.g. 2 Sam. 7.8; Isa. 65.10;
Jer. 23.3; 33.12; 49.20; Ezek. 25.5; 34.14). The verb pqat may indicate a
periodic stock-taking, which is the primary sense of the verb, which only
secondarily means to visit.
means to miss the mark, be the loser (e.g. 1 Kgs 1.21), with primarily no moral connotation. The meaning to be a sinner is secondary.
26. beela has no parallel in Classical Hebrew, and is taken as a scribal error
for bela, in your vigour (cf. Deut. 34.7) (so Ball after Cheyne), bele,
in your vigour (Merx), or even belh, in the fulness (of old age) (Dhorme).
Rabbinical ingenuity suggests that Jobs age is indicated (2+20+30+8 = 60)!
kela is probably an Aramaism; cf. Syr. kela (health) and Arab. kalia (to
be stern, rm).
g is not a sheaf or shock of corn, but the pile of sheaves that were
gathered together in the eld as loads to be transported (lit. brought up) to
the threshing-oor (Exod. 20.5; Judg. 15.5) on an airy height by the village.
27. aqarnh (we have searched it out) indicates the thoroughness of the
sage to investigate the declarations of orthodoxy.
1
Job 6 and 7
JOBS FIRST REJOINDER TO ELIPHAZ (CHAPTER 6)
AND HIS EXPOSTULATION WITH GOD (CHAPTER 7)
Jobs reply to the rst round of argument from Eliphaz falls into four parts. In
the rst (6.2-13) he justies his resentment under stress of suffering; in the
second (6.14-30) he declares his disappointment in his friends, who had failed
him with their sympathy in his hour of need; in the third (7.1-15), Job
complains of Gods unremitting torment of him, a mere mortal to whom death
would have been a welcome release; and in the fourth (7.16-21), this theme is
sustained, with the addition that even if Job had sinned he could not harm God
so as to merit such punishment.
The rst two parts are arranged in four strophes each (6.2-4, 5-7, 8-10, 1113; and 6.14-17, 18-21, 22-25, 26-30), and the last two parts in respectively
three (7.1-4, 5-11, 12-15) and two (7.16-19, 20-21).
In the rst part, Job replies to Eliphazs rebuke of his outburst in ch. 3 and
his lack of patience under adversity on which Hebrew wisdom insisted, alleging his exceptional suffering at the hand of God. Jobs excuse for his reaction
is rounded out by two proverbs in the Wisdom tradition (6.5, 6). His sufferings
are described in the gurative and hyperbolic language of the Plaint of the
Sufferer, but his pleading reects the forensic controversy, with the signicant
difference that Jobs plea is not for acquittal but for easeful death, reecting
3.11-13 from Jobs initial expostulation. This is his response to Eliphazs
exhortation to sue for Gods mercy, with the promise of rehabilitation (5.8ff.).
This variation of the literary prototype makes the plea particularly poignant.
In the second part the literary form is the forensic controversy, with the
disloyal friends in place of the legal opponents of the sufferer. The passage in
its subject as well as its gurative language recalls the sufferers complaint of
his friends alienation in the Plaint of the Sufferer in Pss. 31.12 (EVV 11);
38.12 (EVV 11); 41.10 (EVV 9); 55.13-15 (EVV 12-14; 69.9ff. (EVV 8ff.). More
particularly the gure of the friends as a dry wadi (6.15-21) recalls Jeremiahs
reproach to God in Jer. 15.18, though the distinctive contribution of the author
of the Book of Job must be noted in the expansion of the original to a striking
Homeric simile.
In ch. 7 in response to Eliphazs exhortation to make his petition to God
(5.8), with the prospect of a happy ending (5.17-26), with signicant change
from the plural to the singular of the one addressed, Job directly and simply
1
168
Job 6 and 7. Jobs First Rejoinder
addresses God; his address, however, is expostulation rather then prayer. The
language reminiscent of Eliphazs reference to the frailty of humans vis--vis
the angels as prone to sin (4.17ff.), Job cites the hard lot and natural frailty of
humans in general and his own hard lot in particular, with the inevitable
prospect of death and oblivion to invite the mercy of God to let him be in his
miserable life (7.19) or to give him the coup de grce (7.15; cf. 6.8f.). Chapter
7 reects two sapiential texts, with, however, signicant adaptation. First it
recalls Hezekiahs prayer in Isa. 38.10-18, with the harrowing recital of
sufferings with the grim prospect of Sheol (Isa. 38.10). This, however, is the
prelude to the hope of survival as distinct from Job 7, where Sheol is the
culmination of Jobs sufferings (7.8, 10, 21). Second, again perhaps animadverting on Eliphazs theme of human frailty in 4.19ff., the passage, particularly 7.17ff., is a parody of Ps. 8.5ff. (EVV 4ff.). The psalmist asks What is
man?, physically so insignicant in the universe, that God should pay him
special attention as the apex of creation; with mortals limitations in mind Job
asks the same question why God should sustain and promote them simply to
subject them to inquisition and torment. In this context the citation of the
mythological theme of Gods inveterate hostility to Sea and Tannin, in view
of the traditional association with the Hymn of Praise celebrating the victory
of God as King conrming the establishment of Order against the menace of
Chaos which it naturally evoked in Jewish readers, is tantamount to
questioning the justice of the Judge of all the earth.
Chapter 6
1.
Then Job answered and said,
2.
Would that my resentment were weighed

And that they put my ruin1 with it in the balances;
Then it would prove heavier than the sand of the sea;
For this reason are my words impassioned,
For the arrows of the Almighty are against me
And my spirit drinks their venom;
The sudden attacks of the Almighty wear me out.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
Does the wild ass bray over his pasture?

Does the ox low over his fodder?
Is that which is insipid eaten without salt?
Is there any taste in bland from cheese?
My very being refuses to eat,
My inwards2 loathe3 my food.
Would that my request were realized,
That God could grant what I hope for!
That it would please God to crush me,
To unleash his power and cut me off!
The Book of Job

10.
Even that would be my consolation,

I would leap for joy in my unremitting anguish,4
That I had not concealed declaration concerning the Holy One.5
11.
What is my strength that I should hold out?

What my appointed end that I should patiently endure?
Is my strength the strength of stones?
Is my esh bronze?6
Even if I were to increase my help a hundred-fold7
My effective power would be driven from me.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
To one who is in despair8 ill-will from his friend

Is as though one abandoned the fear of the Almighty.
My brothers are ckle as a winter torrent,
Like empty watercourses,9 which have owed away,
Which are dark by reason of the ice-oe,
And in which snow ows,
But when they run off they vanish,
In the heat they are extinguished from their place.
The caravans make a detour,10
They go off into the desert and perish;
The caravans of Tema looked out,
The trains of Sheba set their hopes on them;
They were confounded in their trust,11
They reached the wadi and were disappointed.
Even so12 you have been to me,13
You see a single terror14 and are afraid.
Is it that I have said Give me something?
Or Give a bribe on my behalf from your wealth?
Or Rescue me from the power of the enemy?
Or Ransom me from brigands?
Instruct me, and I will be silent,
Make me to understand wherein I have erred.
How aggravating are the words of rectitude!
But what sort of censure is censure from you?
Is it your intention to criticize my words,
The utterances of a desperate man (spoken) for relief?
Yea, you would cast lots for an orphan,
And haggle over your friend.
Now please face up to me,
Surely I will not lie to your face.
Be done.15 Let there be no injustice;
Relent, for my case is still just.16
Is there distortion on my tongue?
Can my palate not discriminate words?
169
170

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
Reading haww with LXX, S, V, T and four Heb. MSS for MT wehayy; see
Commentary ad loc.
Reading ke for MT kiew; see Commentary ad loc.
Reading zihamh for MT hmmh after LXX and supported by the parallelism.
Reading l for MT lh; see Commentary ad loc.
The colon after the bicolon which closes the strophe 6.8-10 may refer to Jobs
satisfaction in stating a case against Gods undue persecution of a mere mortal in
ch. 7, but in the context of 6.8-10 and 11f. it seems a gloss, as indicated by the term
the Holy One, the only such designation of God in the Book of Job.
Reading neuh, attaching h of the following haim of MT to the unfamiliar form
n.
Reading haamenn (ezr ) for MT haim n ezr after Graetz.
Reading lannms or lenms for MT lamms; see Commentary ad loc.
Reading kaaqm lm for MT kaaq nelm; see Commentary ad loc.
Reading yelappe for MT yille to supply the transitive verb which the object
darkm requires.
Reading be with S and T for MT b.
Conjecturing kn for MT k.
Reading l with LXX, S and one Heb. MS for MT l.
Reading a aa in a four-beat colon to balance the metre of v. 21 after the
emendation of MT k to kn.
Reading obb, taking the verb as cognate of Arab. abba, to be ended (of a
matter) or to settle down (of a person), so we might paraphrase rest the case.
Reading b for MT bh, y being corrupted to h in the Old Heb. script.
2. l introduces an unrealizable wish (GKC, 159.3; 151.2). hayy should
probably be emended to haww, as in 30.13; cf. haww (Prov. 19.13; Pss.
57.2; 91.3).
3. k-atth, which introduces a letter after the greeting, here introduces the
apodosis after the protasis which states the condition potentially fullled.
Sand was proverbially heavy; cf. Prov. 27.3 and the Wisdom of Ahiqar VII,
112f., ANET, p. 429: I have lifted sand and I have carried salt, but there is
nothing which is heavier than (anger). The sand of the sea is hyperbolic. In
view of the reference in Prov. 27.3 to the fool as heavier than sand Job 6.3
may specically allude to Jobs impatient expostulation under stress of
adversity in 4.5 and 5.3, so out of character in a sage.
The root lh is used of rash oaths in Prov. 20.25, though the pointing in
that passage suggests a different root, either la or a variant of Arab. walaa
(to be impassioned).
Tur-Sinai evidently takes the verb as a cognate of Arab. laa(w) (to babble),
rendering (my words) are stammering. Jobs assurance, however, and his
articulate argument is far from stammering; though certainly impassioned.
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4. For imm, against, we may cite Ugaritic im; cf. Heb. nilam im (to
ght against) and y im (to make a sortie against). Wounding by the
arrows of God is a conventional gure for afiction in the Plaint of the
Sufferer (e.g. Ps. 38.3 [EVV 2]); cf. Job 16.12f., where Job declares that he is
the target for the arrows of God. Mowinckel (1955: 325), Steinmann (1955:
111) and Fohrer (1989: 169) think of the arrows of the plague-god Reeph,
called in Phoenician inscriptions bl (lord of the arrow); cf. Greek Apollo
the Far-Shooter, but, as the sequel indicates, the military gure is intended.
ra in this context probably denotes the spiritual element of God-given
reason, patience and self-control which distinguishes humans from the beasts,
deriving from their consciousness of afnity with God (cf. 10.12).
We would retain v. 4c to form a tricolon punctuating the strophe vv. 2-4 as
against the proposal to treat it as a gloss (so Fohrer). bim, usually rendered
terrors, is found in the OT only here and in Ps. 88.17, but may rather be
connected, as G.R. Driver (1955: 73) suggested, with Arab. baata (to come
suddenly upon), hence sudden attacks, as in 3.5. yaaren seems at rst
sight to suggest a connection with maareh (battle-line) in the context of a
military metaphor; so V, T and S. ra in the sense to dress the ranks is
usually transitive, but is used without an explicit object (e.g. Judg. 20.30; Jer.
50.14), but the direct object of the person against whom the ranks are formed
is highly suspect. LXX and Jerome in his commentary render goad me, which
suggested to Siegfried the reading yaareqn. Beer, Dillmann, Budde and
Hlscher assume metathesis in MT and read yaaern (troubled me). Peters,
following S seraan (has terried me) proposed the emendation yaarn.
MT, however, is defended by G.R. Driver, who takes ra as a cognate of
Arab. araka (to wear out).
5. The verbs nhaq and gh (bray, low) are used in parallelism in the Ras
Shamra legend of Krt (Gordon, UT Krt 120f., 224f.) in a passage relating to
beasts in the starvation of a siege (cf. Joel 1.18). This long-attested usage of
nhaq, which is used besides only once in the OT (Job 30.7), despite its
incidence in Aram. and Arab., should warn us against the assumption that it is
either an Aramaism or an Arabism in Job.
pere is the wild ass, or onager, which dees domestication (39.3-8). It is
selected as parallel to the domestic ox to give a comprehensive picture.
Fittingly its food is described as dee, natural grass (Gen. 1.11) as distinct
from fodder (bell, lit. mixed, i.e. chopped straw [Arab. tibn] and corn, Isa.
30.24; cf. billl, to give fodder, Judg. 19.21).
6. tl is used here in its literal sense, insipidness; see further on 1.22.
The context indicates that rr allm denotes an insipid substance.
allm is the doubtful word. The only help given in the ancient versions is in
S and T. The former reads juice (rr) of the anchusa, or purple plant (rrh
dalem) (so Terrien), or some other plant (Hlscher, Stevenson, Fohrer,
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Gordis, Horst). T renders the white and the yolk of an egg. rr (1 Sam. 21.13)
would support one or the other in the sense of juice or uid. As the more
familiar substance the white of an egg (lit. the saliva around the yolk), this
might seem more likely in the context. A.S. Yahuda (1903: 702), however,
suggested that allmu is cognate with Arab. almu(n) (soft cheese). In
this case rr would be the insipid uid left after cheese-making, that is, bland
(so Pope).
7. See textual note.
na is ambiguous, meaning either myself or my appetite or even my
throat. The passage re-echoes 33.20.
linga immediately suggests the well-known Hebrew root na (to
touch), which again, as G.R. Driver suggests (1944a: 168), may be cognate
with Arab. najaa (to eat food to ones advantage), and would explain the
lack of a direct object, which na (to touch) demands. After the reference
to insipid food zihamh ke lam (my inwards, lit. liver, loathe my
food), as Dhorme after Wright, DriverGray, Budde, Beer et al. for MT
hmmah kiew lam (they are as sickness of my food) is most apposite; cf.
33.20 for support of the emendation.
9. The root yal is found always in the Hiphil, meaning to consent, followed
naturally by the jussive. yattr (let him unleash) is the Hiphil jussive of
nar, a rare verb in this sense in Isa. 58.6, and meaning to set (prisoners)
free in Pss. 105.20; 146.7.
bi means to cut off a part from the whole; cf. Arab. baatu(n) (a
piece), bau(n) (divorce).
10. The adverb d should be emphasized, meaning yet, with the sense of
nevertheless, as in the Plaint of the Sufferer, Ps. 42.6, 12 (EVV 5, 11).
The root sla is not known elsewhere in the OT, but is known in postBiblical Hebrew meaning to recoil. LXX and T support the meaning would
jump for joy.
The verbal noun (inn. constr.) l means writhing, for example, in childbirth (Isa. 26.7) or anguish (Exod. 15.14). The masculine singular preformative in yaml indicates that bel should be read for MT belh, y being
corrupted to h in the Old Heb. script.
If v. 10c is original it would be the third colon of a tricolon, which might be
used for punctuation, as occasionally in the Ras Shamra couplets. Stevenson
and Horst see in this verse and particularly in v. 10c a reference to the authors
consciousness of his task as a sage of insight not to conceal declarations
concerning the Holy One, so that the truths he had reached in his ordeal
should be communicated as his contribution to nal truth (so Weiser). Taking
ki in the sense of efface or deny, which it occasionally has, and imr
as commandment (cf. Prov. 2.1; 7.5; 19.7; Isa. 41.26), Terrien understands
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Job to be imploring Gods coup de grce that he may die before he is tempted
to deny Gods commandments. But it is probably a gloss (so Siegfried, Duhm,
Beer, Hlscher, Mowinckel, Fohrer). See textual note ad loc.
11. The parallelism with ayal indicates that aar na denotes patience;
cf. tiqar r (21.4) and qr np in the Ugaritic Krt text (Gordon UT 127.34,
47), meaning one whose endurance has been foreshortened. This passage
refutes Dhormes objection that if patience were denoted in 11b ra and not
nee would have been used. He accordingly translates I should prolong my
life.
q denotes the appointed end, or term, rather than simply the end (cf. LXX
the time), as the parallel of midda ymay (the measure of my days) in Ps.
39.5 (EVV 4) indicates. q is familiar in the Dead Sea Manual of Discipline,
the War of the Sons of Light and the Hymns, meaning the appointed time; cf.
Arab. qaa(y) (to decide). We recall the expression of an Arab guest at the
end of a meal qaayt(u) (have nished).
13. The double interrogative in MT haim is awkward, and was felt as such by
the ancient versions, which, however, are not in agreement. Modern commentators also disagree, following either S or V in reading h im (Behold,
if?) (so Hlscher) or LXX or had I not trusted in him? (so DriverGray).
The former reading points the Aramaic particle h (Behold), which would
be an exception in Job. Duhm read h mayin ezr (See, where is my
help in me [coming from?]). LXX suggests a reading hal n ezr (Is it
not that I have no help in him?); cf. Dhorme, hal mayin ezr (Is not
my help in me a nonentity?). Horst retains MT, stressing haim in the only
place it occurs in the OT, Num. 17.28, where, however, the text is equally
doubtful. After Buttenweiser and Sutcliffe v. 13 begins with the interrogative
participle im, h being displaced from the end of neah (MT n). Kissane
reads h after neah which would include the aleph of MT im and permit a
reading mayin ezr (My help in myself is nothing, i.e. my own help is
nothing). But see textual note ad loc. on Graetzs reading haamenn ezr
, taking amenn as a denominative verb, Piel with the energic ending of
the imperfect (so also Dahood 1965: 13). ezr indicates that the parallel
tiyyh means effective power. See above on 5.12.
14. MT as it stands might conceivably mean lit. to one who is melting loyal
love is due from his friends, even though he would abandon the fear of God
(so Weiser and Terrien). msas means secondarily to despair (e.g. Josh. 2.11;
5.1; 7.5; Isa. 13.7; Neh. 2.11), but there the verb is in the Niphal and the
subject is heart.
In view of this attested usage MT lamms may be a corruption of lenms;
alternatively it has been suggested (Hitzig, Friedrich Delitzsch, Snaith 1968:
111) that ese here, as in Lev. 20.17 and Prov. 16.34, and in Syr. and Aram.,
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means envy or ill-will, giving the meaning To one in despair ill-will from
his friend is as though one forsook the fear of God. Assuming that ese has
its usual meaning loyalty, LXX, S, V and T make the further assumption of
the reading m (withdrawing) from m, generally intransitive, but transitive in Zech. 3.9. This would give the sense As for (MT le) the man who
withdraws loyalty from his friend, he abandons the fear of the Almighty,
which to be sure accords with the context, but no more than the interpretation
of Hitzig and others we have noted. The assumption of m for MT ms
(possibly nms) is very doubtful and the deviation of the versions is caused
by their failure to notice that the poet is effecting a word-play with ese in
the sense opposite to the more familiar one in a convention known in Arab.
literature as ad. Dhorme, Stevenson, Hlscher and Fohrer take v. 14 as a
marginal gloss to v. 15, thus, in the opinion of the writer, failing to appreciate
the idiom so characteristic of the poet in Job.
15. The gure of the ash ood recalls Jer. 15.18. The repetition of naal is
intolerable in the original and here we would suggest an emendation of aq
nelm to aqm lm (empty watercourses); cf. ar-rubull, the
Empty Quarter in SE Arabia. yaar is formally, meaning either to overow, or, as here, to ow away. The clause is relative with the omission of
the relative particle, as frequently in Ugaritic poetry and in Arab. after an
indenite antecedent; cf. 11.16 kemayim er (as water that has owed
away).
16. In qerm minn-qera, Dhorme, after Avronin and Rabinowitz and
certain rabbinic authorities, takes qerm to mean covered (lit. darkened),
but there is no objection to rendering darkened by reason of the (minn) iceoe. One suspects that the rabbinic rendering of qerm was prompted by the
parallel yiallem-ele, where the verb was assumed to be the familiar word
to obscure. But this may rather be cognate with Arab. alima meaning in the
IV form to ow.
17. This couplet caused some trouble to the ancient versions and to modern
commentators through the uncertainty as to the meaning of the hapax
legomenon yezre. The parallelism with beumm has suggested yere,
they are scorched (cf. Prov. 16.27; Ezek. 21.3), the phonetic variation /z
being attested in aq/zaq. But yezre may be retained as cognate with
the Arab. root from which mizrab (canal) is formed; cf. Late Heb. marz
(gutter), as recognized by Qimchi, hence the translation melt, run off.
ma is well attested, meaning to annihilate in the OT and in Ugaritic
(Gordon UT nt II.8); cf. Arab amata (to be silent).
The nal waw in MT beumm should probably be attached to the following
nia (they are extinguished).
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18. On the reading yelappe (transitive before darkm) see textual note. th,
the description of primaeval chaos (Gen. 1.2 [P]) means here desert, and is
parallel to mibr in Deut. 32.10 and used of a trackless wilderness in 12.24
and Ps. 107.40; cf. Arab. thu(u) (desert). It aptly describes the tangle of
wadis off the beaten track in the desert.
a means to go astray in 1 Sam. 9.3, 20; Jer. 50.6; Ezek. 34.4, 16 and
perhaps Deut. 26.5. Both this meaning and to perish would suit the present
context.
19. On Teima and Sheba see above, p. 36. Here Sheba may denote the
mercantile kingdom of S. Arabia, and not as in 1.15 a locality in the Hejaz like
Teima.
20. Read be; see textual note.
b means they were confounded or disappointed as in Isa. 1.29; 20.5;
Jer. 2.36; 12.13; 48.13; Ezek. 32.30; 36.32, the verb being parallel with ar
(to be abashed, disappointed), as in Pss. 35.26; 40.15.
21. On the reading knl see textual note.
a is a hapax legomenon in the OT, perhaps the nomen unitatis of a
(terror) (41.25; Gen. 9.2); cf. Ass. attu (terror). Perhaps the singular
should be emphasized in the present passage, a single terror. This may refer
to the infectious danger of associating with one evidently under the wrath of
God, which prompted Job to sit on the ash-heap.
22. ka is used here in the unusual sense of wealth, like ayil; cf. Prov.
5.10.
ia (lit. give a bribe) gives a graphic insight into the ancient Semitic
community where friendship extended even to bribing ofcials in the interest
of ones friends.
23. The nature of the oppressor (r) is not specied, but rm implies highhanded oppressors, such as chiefs of raiding desert tribes and others. In those
circumstances ransom (cf. tidn) must have been often in demand.
25. After T and Rashi mah-nnimle (how sweet) is read by Graetz, Duhm,
Dhorme, Hlscher; cf. 119.103. The text and usual sense of mra and its
Arab. cognate need not be altered, since Job is presenting the correct, but
unsympathetic, moralizing of his friends in his distress, which has the same
effect as a crippling curse (qellh nimree) in 1 Kgs 2.8. Hence with Horst
we render How aggravating are the words of rectitude!
26. The emphasis in v. 26a lies on millm (words), the captious logical
arguments of the friends being criticized. The translation of v. 26b the
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speeches of one that is desperate (n; cf. Arab. yaia, to be desperate)

are for the wind rather misses the point. The sense is rather that the sufferer
must nd relief in speech; cf. 32.20, aabberh weyirwa- l, I will speak to
nd relief.
27. The sentiment is the disapproval of kicking a man when he is down,
applying the letter of logic as men apply the law in the case of the orphan sold
for his parents debts instead of exercising sympathy. The Hiphil of nal,
understanding grl (lot), is instanced in 1 Sam. 14.42.
krh (to buy; cf. Deut. 2.6; Hos. 3.2), has the force of seeking to buy,
expressing the activity of merchants, in 40.30, where, as here, it is used with
al, and may be translated haggle over, here signifying chop logic with, or
insist impersonally on the moral law of sin and retribution.
28. Now in forensic style Job turns from criticism of his friends to a pointed
plea to respond seriously to the justice of his case. pnh be meaning to look
at, address oneself to, occurs in Eccl. 2.11.
im akazz is the strong negative in the truncated oath-formula with the
omission of the oath in the apodosis.
29. On our reading of MT b in v. 29a, bb, cognate of Arab. abba (to be
ended, of a matter, to settle down, of a person), see textual note. For MT u
in v. 29b read withdraw from the attitude assumed by Jobs friends.
This is another case of word-play between a more familiar word (here in
colon b) and the less familiar homonym in colon a.
eeq is used here in its forensic sense of having a just case.
30. The unexpected collocation of ikk (my palate) and yn (understands, here in the radical sense discriminates) must be noted. Job has not
only a discriminating mind, but this is reected in his speech and arguments,
which follow in the Dialogue, despite the allegation of the friends that Job is a
loudmouth and a windbag (8.2, Bildad; 11.2f., Zophar; 15.2, Eliphaz). We
agree with Pope in taking haww, not as calamity as in 6.2 and 30.13, but as
the plural of Ugaritic hwt and Akk. awatu (word), with a cognate in modern
Syrian Arab. The sentiment is reected in 12.11:
hal-zen milln tin
we el yiam-l.
Does not the ear test words,
And the palate taste food?
The Book of Job
Chapter 7
Jobs Expostulation to God
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
Has not a man a time of service on the earth?

Are not his days as the days of a hireling?
Like a slave that gasps for the shade,
Or like a hireling that longs for his wages,
So I have been allotted months of emptiness,
And nights of trouble are assigned to me.
Whenever I lie down I say,
When shall I rise?
And as night is dragged out
I have my ll of tossing until dawn.
My esh is clothed with corruption
And scab has covered1 my skin.
(It has broken out and suppurated.2)
My days are swifter than a loom,
They are gone without hope.
Remember that my life is but wind,
My eye shall not again see good.
The eye that looks for me will not mark me;
Your eyes will be on me, and I shall not be there.
A cloud is gone and passes,
Even so he who goes down to Sheol does not come up.
He returns to his house no more,
And his place recognizes him no more.
But even I will not withold my speech,
I will speak in my anguish of spirit,
Complain in my bitterness of soul.
Am I Sea or Tannin
That you set a guard over me?
If I say, My couch will give me comfort,
My bed will ease the burden of my complaint,
You terrify me with dreams
And frighten me with hallucinations,
So that I would cordially choose strangling,
Death rather than my torment.3
I have had enough,4 I shall not live forever;
Hold off from me, for my days are but a vapour.
What is man that you rear him
And pay any heed to him,
Taking note of him every morning,
Testing him every moment?
How long will you refuse to look away from me,
Not letting me alone till I swallow my spittle?
177
178
20.
21.

If I sin how can I affect you,
You who watch men?
Why do you make me a mark for your attacks?
And why am I a charge upon you?5
Why not unburden me of my sin,
And pass over my iniquity?
For then I should lie down in the dust,
And you would seek me and I would not exist.
Textual Notes to the Chapter 7

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Reading we ar r for MT we r r; see Commentary ad loc.

A secondary expansion; see Commentary ad loc.
Reading aey for MT aemy; see Commentary ad loc.
Reading missatt for MT mast; see Commentary ad loc.
A scribal adjustment (tiqqn serm), lay being written for ley to obviate the
theological difculty of the conception of God as liable to any burden.
1. b, as Aq. and V appreciate, refers to a period of military service, as in
14.14 and Isa. 40.2, though LXX and Jerome in his commentary take it in the
more general sense of ordeal, which would also suit Isa. 40.2.
r may also be used in the more general sense of hired servant or daylabourer (LXX), but probably denotes a mercenary soldier, as in Jer. 46.21; cf.
the verb in 2 Sam. 10.6.
2. pal means work and also the reward of work; cf. Jer. 22.13. In this sense
peullh is more common (Lev. 19.13; Prov. 10.16; Ezek. 29.20).
3. LXX, S and V read the passive munn for MT minn (have been allotted,
lit. numbered). MT may nevertheless be retained as an instance of the active
verb with indenite subject with the signicance of a passive.
4. im with the perfect is used to express as often as; cf. Gen. 38.9; Num.
21.9; Judg. 6.3; Pss. 41.7; 94.18; Isa. 24.13. In this case it may be followed by
waw and the perfect, as here. The sentiment re-echoes Deut. 28.67.
midda, if MT is sound, must be the adverbial accusative, throughout the
length LXX has a fuller text, which may have read:
im at wemart may hayym
qm may ere
midd ere at neum a-ne
As often as I lie down I say, When will it be day?
I rise up (and say), When (will it be) evening?
The whole night long I have my ll of tossing until dawn.
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The last colon is abnormally long, and midd ere may have crept into the
text as a variant on MT may ere. In this case MT represents a telescoped
text.
5. In MT wy r, g or g is rendered clods in LXX and T, which would
signify in this context the crust of the earth (Dhorme), so guratively scab.
G.R. Driver (1955: 73-76) cites Arab. jau(n), rough skin, and takes pr not
as a noun r, as in MT, but as a verb ar, cognate with Arab. afara (to
cover), reading the second colon in v. 5 as we ar r (And scab covers
my skin). This is an excellent suggestion, and Driver continues, reading raa
wayyimmas for MT ra wayyimms and rendering It breaks out and
suppurates. raa wayyimmas or MT ra wayyimms, however, is suspect
as either a defective third member of a tricolon, for which there is no reason
here, or as a gloss, as which it is treated by Driver.
6. Tur-Sinai has questioned the usual rendering of ere as a weavers
shuttle, proposing that the word is cognate with Arab. arija (to exhale a
smell) and rendering smoke, which is noted as being quickly dispelled. This
is just possible, but unlikely. The verb ra and its participle r are
familiar in the OT, meaning to weave and loom (Exod. 28.32; Judg. 16.13;
1 Sam. 17.7; 2 Sam. 21.19; 2 Kgs 23.7; Isa. 59.5). ere in the Samson story
(Judg. 16.13) means loom rather than shuttle which, however, the present
gure particularly visualizes, as the word-play on tiqwh (hope, thread)
indicates.
Dhorme renders beees tiqwh as for lack of thread, beees having this
sense in Prov. 26.20. This interpretation had occurred already to ibn Ezra, and
there is probably a word-play here between tiqwh, thread (cf. Rahabs
scarlet thread in Josh. 2.18, 21), which connects with what precedes, and the
more familiar tiqwh which in the word-play so beloved of the author connects
with what follows. Unfortunately this cannot be so neatly expressed in
translation.
7. Remember that my life is but wind (ra) seems like a quotation of Ps.
78.39, And he remembered that they were but esh, a wind that passes and
comes not again.
8. The verb r is limited to poetic parts of the OT and found more often in
Job than elsewhere (cf. 17.15; 20.9; 24.15; 34.29; 35.5, 13, 14). It means
generally to regard, mark, and in Hos. 13.7 to watch as a lurking leopard.
But here it is a synonym of rh (to see) as in the poetic Balaam-oracles in
Num. 23.9; 24.17 (JE).
9. Sheol, thought of as under the earth, as the verb yra indicates, is for the
Hebrews as for the Mesopotamians the land of no return (Akk. aru l tru,
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cf. Job 10.21). It is nebulous, neuter existence (3.13-19), where humans have
no hope of seeing good. It is against this prevailing conception of the
afterlife that passages like 19.25-27 must be critically considered.
10. In And his place recognizes him no more (wel-yakkrenn meqm)
the author makes a verbal citation of Ps. 103.16, with the general sentiment of
which on the transience of human life without prospect of a hereafter he is in
agreement, like contemporary Jewish thought.
11. With the tricolon Jobs account of his troubles ends and vv. 12ff. are
occupied with his complaint directly to God.
12. Sea (ym) and tannn are now known from the Baal myth of Ras Shamra
to be powers of Chaos which militated against the Order of God in nature. The
nature of tnn in those texts is not specied. This imagery was adopted in Israel
in the liturgy of the great autumn festival, to which it properly belonged in
Canaan. Thus Sea became the inveterate enemy of God and his Order,
especially in Enthronement Psalms in the OT (e.g. Pss. 46.2-3 [EVV 1-2];
74.12-15 [EVV 11-14]; 89.10-11 [EVV 9-10]; 93.3-4; 98.7-8; 104.6-7) with
echoes elsewhere in Hebrew literature (e.g. Isa. 51.9-11; Ezek. 29.3; 32.2ff.)
where Egypt is equated with Tannin and Rahab the Restless One, that is, the
Sea. So in Dan. 7.3ff. the great beasts, which militated against God and his
people, came up from the sea.
In the Apocalypse of Baruch after the establishment of the Messiah as King
and before his nal judgment on all peoples the earth is threatened by a ood
of black waters (2 Bar. 70.1ff). In the Psalms of Solomon (2.28ff.) the
providence of God is vindicated in the downfall of Pompey, which is
described in the same imagery: But thou, O Lord, delay not to recompense
them on their own heads, to cast down the insolence of the dragon (Syr.
tann) in humiliation. The setting of a guard (mimr) over the sea refers
generally to the conception of the power of Chaos against which God continually has to assert his authority in myth and ritual in Mesopotamia and
Canaan and, with its own adaptation, in Israel, and refers perhaps particularly
to Marduks conning the defeated monster Tiamat, the Lower Deep, under
bolts, posting guards over it, as is described in the Babylonian New Year
liturgy in the myth Enuma elish. The consciousness of being watched
narrowly by God, the watcher of humans (nr m) (v. 20), supports the
normal meaning of mimr (guard).
13. k is employed here as the conditional conjunction by way of variation
from the more usual im.
n, meaning to share the burden of, followed by be is found in Num.
11.17. Here be may have the sense of the more regular min as in Ugaritic with
the partitive force (cf. 21.25; 39.17).
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181
15. Reading aey, from aee (sorrow) for MT aemy (my

bones); cf. 9.28.
16. Fohrer regards MT mast as a gloss on v. 15, but the 4:4 meter used in
v. 16 as a variation from the regular 3:3 meter is against this. Reiske, Merx,
Siegfried and Duhm retain mast, connecting it with mwe maemy in
v. 15b, rendering I despise death more than my pains, or, as Duhm prefers,
Death I despise because of my pains. Driver Gray (1921: II, 47) object that
mas means to reject, but cf. 9.21, 19.18; Amos 5.21; Prov. 15.32; Judg.
9.38 (hal zeh hm aer masth b, Is not this the people that you
despised?). Pope proposes that mast is the verb in a relative clause without
the relative particle, of which the antecedent is aey, which he renders
my loathsome pains. This again, however, ignores the 4:4 meter in v. 16.
Tur-Sinais suggestion, however, may be adapted, to read missatt (I have had
enough) from a root msa with this sense, familiar in Aram. and Syr. and
attested in Classical Hebrew in Deut. 10.10. It restores the parallelism with
aal mimmenn (hold off from me). My days are but a vapour (heel).
This noun is used guratively as vanity in the famous refrain in Ecclesiastes,
but means radically vapour, as in Arab. bahlatu(u).
17. The verse which contrasts the signicance of ephemeral humans with the
scrupulous visitation of a critical God is a parody of Psalm 8, the language of
which it re-echoes, and of Ps. 144.3-4, which contrasts the apparent insignicance of humans with Gods peculiar love and care for them. As regularly in
Hebrew, the heart (l) is the seat of cognition rather than affection.
18. On pqa, here to take special note of, see on 5.24.
lieqrm means every morning; cf. lirem (every moment). This noun
(cf. berea, 21.13) is derived from a verb describing the ickering, that is, of
an eyelid (cf. Prov. 12.19 [of the tongue]), and may be a metathetic cognate of
Arab. reaja meaning in the VIII form to tremble.
19. kammh means how much (13.23), how often (21.17) and how long
(Ps. 35.17, and here). h (to look steadily at) is used with min, to look
away from, in the sense of overlooking, or averting ones gaze from, in 14.6
and Isa. 22.4, as here.
Till I swallow my spittle recalls the Arab. expression cited by Schultens,
ablin rqi (Let me swallow my spittle, i.e. Leave me a moment).
20. The metrical arrangement here is suggested by 35.6a, where Elihu quotes
Jobs arguments (If you sin now do you affect him?), as follows:
mh eal l, where is a hypothetical perfect in a conditional sentence (GKC, 159b, h). The following words nr hm are thought to
give too short a colon in v. 20b, but if they are stressed to give the effect of
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182
bitter irony this difculty is overcome. In this case there may be double
entendre in nr, watcher, in the sense of protector (cf. Arab. naara, with
this meaning of watching critically, and Arab. naara to watch, e.g. crops; so
Prov. 27.18). In the present passage the emphasis falls rather on God as
Grand Inquisitor.
A mark for your attacks, mig, lit. an object of encounter; cf. migm,
the targets of lightning (36.32) and 16.12, he has set me up as his target
(marh). As the mark of the arrows of God we may render both nouns as
butt.
On the scribal adjustment lay lema for ley lema see textual
note. Lindblom (1966: 214) makes the interesting suggestion that this couplet
refers to two sports or trials of skill, the second to the lifting and heaving of a
heavy stone as a trial of strength, to which Ben Sira 6.21 and possibly Zech.
12.3 refer. This is possible, though we prefer the translation Why am I a
charge upon you? (i.e. are you obliged to punish my sin?).
21. We should see a word-play on n in ma in v. 20c, and in ti in
v. 21a, the rst indicating burdening oneself with the obligation of exacting
retribution for sin and the second lifting off the burden of sin. There is a
similar polarity of meaning in the verb to return to God, repent and to
relapse into sin.
The dust here is not merely the synonym of ground (ere), as it often is,
but the dust of Sheol.
ir, used in 24.5 of wild asses looking for their food, denotes anxious
search or expectancy. It may be connected with aar (dawn), hence may
mean to seek early, or urgently, as, with God as object (Isa. 26.4; Hos. 5.15;
Ps. 63.2 [EVV 1]; 78.34 [EVV 33]) and Wisdom (Prov. 1.28).
Job 8
BILDADS FIRST EXPOSTULATION
The argument, mainly a sapiential controversy, in support of the theodicy, is

arranged in seven strophes of three couplets (8.2-4, 5-7, 8-10, 11-13, 14 + 15 +
19, 16-18, 20-22), of which 8.11-13, 14, 15, 19, 16-18 are gures. The recognition of this arrangement suggests that v. 19 is displaced in MT from after
v. 15, where with vv. 14-15 it forms a strophe (so Fohrer).
The rst strophe (vv. 2-4), as often in the rejoinders of the friends of Job, is
in the form of sapiential controversy. The second (vv. 5-7) has as a formal
prototype the prophetic warning of the conditional nature of Gods grace,
which has its ultimate origin in the public address on the subject of blessings
and curses in the context of the Covenant Sacrament at the meeting of the
sacral confederacy (Deut. 28). The third strophe (vv. 8-10) asserts the principle of retribution in true sapiential tradition on the basis of traditional
experience, and the fourth (vv. 11-13) sustains the theme of the failure of the
wicked on the basis of a gure from nature (vv. 11-12), while the fth (vv. 14,
15, 19) and sixth (vv. 16-18) strophes elaborate the theme by the gure of a
spiders web and a blasted plant respectively. The last strophe (vv. 20-22)
asserts the theodicy with regard both to the innocent and the wicked in
antithesis in the tradition of wisdom literature, which has also a counterpart in
the statement of faith in the Plaint of the Sufferer in the Psalms. This has a
variation in the promise of relief (v. 21) and the threat of retribution of the
wicked (v. 22), the former echoing the promise of relief ( e) from the
liturgy of a great public festival, voiced by the prophets, and the latter
recalling the curse of the sufferers adversaries as a token of the theodicy in
the general context of the Plaint of the Sufferer, particularly in Pss. 35.8, 26;
40.14-15 (EVV 13-14); 58.6-9.
Bildad upholds the wisdom tradition in animadverting on Jobs impatient
and impassioned reaction to his misfortune (vv. 1-2), asserting the sapiential
dogma of sin and retribution (vv. 3, 20), referring Job to the authority of
ancient sages (vv. 9-10), and defending the justice of God (v. 3) against those
who would deny it on the evidence of the apparent ourishing of the wicked
who ignore Gods grace on which they depend, citing the swift withering of
the reeds cut from the marsh (vv. 11-13), their substantial and precarious
support by the gure of the fragile spiders web (v. 14) and by the withering of
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184
Job 8. Bildads First Expostulation
a plant rooted among stones (vv. 16-18). He does not charge Job explicitly
with his own sin as the cause of his suffering, though that is implied. But
signicantly he does not abandon belief in this causal connection, assuming
the possibility of Jobs suffering for the sins of his family (v. 4; cf. 1.5),
though to be sure this is only a possibility. But, like Ezekiel (18.4; cf. Deut.
24.16), he advances from communal to personal responsibility (v. 6), and like
Eliphaz (5.8) he counsels the sufferer to seek the mercy of the Almighty (v. 5),
and like Eliphaz he presents the prospect of hope (vv. 6f., 21) The sapiential
tenet of the theodicy in its negative and positive aspects is summarily stated in
the concluding strophe (vv. 20f.; cf. Ps. 1).
Chapter 8
1.
Then Bildad the Shuhite answered and said:
2.
How long will you say these things,

And the words of your mouth be as a great bluster?
Does God pervert Justice,
Does the Almighty do violence1 to what is right?
If your sons have offended
He has given them over into the power of their sin.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
19.
1
If you too look earnestly to God

And seek the mercy of the Almighty,
If you are pure and upright,
Then he will protect you,
And keep your righteous homestead intact.
Though your beginning has been insignicant
Your latter end shall be greatly abundant.2
Nay, but ask a former generation,
Apply yourself to the researches of their fathers,
For we are but of yesterday3 and know nothing,
Our days on the earth are as4 a shadow.
Will they not teach you, declaring to you,
And bring forth words from their minds?
Can papyrus grow without marsh,
Reeds abound without water?
If it is cut,5 still fresh as it is,
It withers sooner than any grass.
Even so is the latter end6 of all who forget God,
And the hope of the impious perishes.
His condence is a cobweb,7
His trust a spiders dwelling.
He leans upon his house, and it does not stand fast,
He grasps it, but it does not stand rm.
Lo, this is the dissolution8 of his way,
And from the dust another springs.9
The Book of Job

16.
17.
18.
20.
21.
22.
185
He is as a fresh plant before (sc. struck by) the sun,

Its suckers spread over the yard where it grows;
Its roots entwine about the stone-heaps,
Taking hold between the stones.10
Suddenly11 it is destroyed12 from where it grew,
(Its place) will deny it, (saying), I never saw you.
Indeed, God does not spurn the innocent,
Nor does he hold the hand of wicked men;
He will yet13 ll14 your mouth with laughter
And your lips with shouts of joy.
Those who hate you will be clothed with shame,
And the tent of the wicked will be no more.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
yeawwh
Reading
for MT yeaww to obviate the repetition of the verb wa. See
Commentary ad loc.
Reading tige for MT yigeh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading mitteml with T for MT eml.
Reading el with S for MT k l.
Reading leyiqq (le enclitic with jussive) for MT l yiqq.
Reading aar with LXX for MT ore.
Reading qiur qayi for MT aer yq. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading mess for MT me; cf. LXX. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yim with LXX, S and one Heb. MS for MT yim.
Reading bn anm with one Heb. MS.
Reading pim, metri causa for MT im.
Reading the passive imperfect energic yeulleenn for MT active.
Reading for MT a.
Reading yemall with certain Heb. MSS for MT yemallh.
1. On Shuhite, see above, p. 136.
2. milll, attested in the OT only here and in 33.3; Gen 21.7 (J); Ps. 106.2, is
generally taken as an Aramaism. The incidence in Gen. 21.7 might seem to
modify that assumption, but that might be an old Aramaism; cf. local features
in N. Israelite sources in the Elisha narratives in Kings (J. Gray 1963: 417f.).
The ambiguity of ra is to be noted, meaning wind and spirit; cf. dier
ra in 16.3.
kabbr, mighty, is conned to Heb. poetry, but is commonly attested in
Aram. and Arab., though it has a Phoenician cognate, which may go back to
an earlier Canaanite root, so far unattested in the Ras Shamra texts.
3. It is unlikely that a poet such as the author of the Book of Job should have
repeated the verb aww in two parallel cola, and LXX, V and T indicate two
1
186
different verbs. The phrase aww mip recurs at 34.12, and the verb is
generally found in later passages (e.g. Ps. 119.78 and Eccl. 1.15; 7.13; 12.3),
though appearing somewhat earlier in Lam. 3.36 and even in Amos 5. It is
likely that MT aww in v. 3b should be emended to yeawwh (do violence
to), possibly cognate with Arab. ha yah, meaning in the II form to bring
calamity upon.
4. Formally wayeallem might belong to the protasis of the conditional
sentence introduced by v. 4a, in which case vv. 5-7 would be the apodosis,
itself containing a condition in vv. 5 and 6a. But we prefer to take the verb
introduced by waw consecutive as apodosis, concluding the rst strophe (cf.
Gen. 43.9). In any case the distinction is made between communal and personal responsibility (cf. Deut. 24.16; Ezek. 18.20), which is indicated by the
repeated atth in vv. 5f. Formally, however, wayyeallem might continue
the protasis in v. 4 before the apodosis in vv. 5-6, itself containing the condition of Jobs innocence and plea for mercy (vv. 5-6). In this case Bildad would
not have quite rid himself of the conception of the involvement of the innocent
man in the sin of his family, though admitting, through upright conduct and
conscious dependence on the grace of God, personal emancipation.
5. On the verb ir see above on 7.21.
6. On the incidence of yr (and tm) in wisdom literature see above on 1.1.
The adjective za is relatively rare in the OT, where it is usually used in the
physical sense rened, for example the oil for the lamps of the sanctuary
(Exod. 27.20; Lev. 24.2) and the incense in the Tent of Meeting (Exod. 30.34;
Lev. 24.7). With a moral connotation it is conned to Job 8.6; 11.4; 16.15;
33.9; Prov. 16.2; 20.11; 21.8, all in wisdom literature.
The verb hiannn is used of supplication in extreme distress or difculty,
as when Joseph pleads for his life with his brothers (Gen. 42.21), Ahaziahs
ofcer before Elijah (2 Kgs 1.13), and Esther before Ahasuerus (Est. 4.8; 8.3),
and less urgently in Solomons prayer at the dedication of the Temple (1 Kgs
8.59).
6. The collocation of yr and illam suggests the formula of greeting in
letters from Ras Shamra: ilm trk tlmk (May the gods protect you and keep
you safe!, PRU II.9; Gordon UT 95; 101; 117; 138; cf. Eissfeldt 1960: 41),
but cf. LXX, he will listen to your prayer, indicating a reading k yr le
(He will hear your prayer). The tricolon among bicola has suggested to
Bickell, Ball, Dhorme, Hlscher, Horst and Fohrer that one of the cola (v. 6a)
is a gloss, or that a colon has been omitted after v. 6c (so Stevenson, Tur-Sinai,
Mowinckel). The Ras Shamra poems, however, have familiarized us with the
occasional tricolon for punctuation or to vary the monotony of the prevailing
bicola, and MT here may well be retained.
1
The Book of Job
187
7. waw with the perfect in wehyh expresses the protasis in a conditional or

concessive sentence, for example, in Gen. 44.22 (GKC, 150g).
gh is a variant of g (to grow tall, be exalted), as in v. 11, for
example, of a palm tree (Ps. 92.13). The verb should be extended to tige or
tigeh in agreement with the subject aare.
8. knn, understanding l (heart, sc. understanding) in the sense of x
your attention on, has been thought to be a corruption of the more common
bnn (understand), but cf. Isa. 51.13.
9. On the text, see textual note.
10. The third masculine plural personal pronoun refers back to fathers in
v. 8, alluding to their utterances. This is taken by some commentators as a
secondary expansion. The verb ymer is weak, and LXX suggests weyagg,
which is to be preferred as expressing attendant circumstances.
11. This couplet is doubtless the citation of a popular proverb, perhaps a
saying of the ancients mentioned in v. 8, which asserted the principle of cause
and effect like the proverbs in Amos 3.3-5. It is not certain, however, that this
was the sense in which it was used by the author here, emphasizing the
collapse of the wicked who fail to appreciate that their prosperity depended on
the sustaining grace of the God they reject.
gh here means to grow tall, with the connotation of ourishing (cf.
10.16, of the head) and of God in Exod. 15.1, 21. gme is used of reeds in the
Nile delta (Exod. 2.3) and of reed skiffs of the Nile (Isa. 18.2). It is an Egyptian loanword km , denoting papyrus, the tallest of reeds, reaching a height of
6 feet. u is also an Egyptian loanword derived from (to be green). It
was known to the Ugaritic poets as a feature of the Huleh marshes, a smk in
N. Palestine (Gordon UT 76.II.9, 12). It was evidently a smaller plant than
gme, as it was grazed by the cows in Josephs dream (Gen. 42.2, 18).
12. is found in the OT only here and in Song 6.11. The word is a cognate
of Akk. ebbu (ourish) and Ugaritic ib (Gordon UT 1 Aqht 30), meaning
verdure; cf. the parallel here, r, herbs of pasture, and Arab. uratu(n),
lit. greens.
On the reading, leyiqq, where the emphatic enclitic le has been taken by
the Masoretes for the negative l, see textual note; cf. 29.24, esaq alhem
l yaamn, where the negative contradicts the sense and must therefore be
read as the enclitic le, I smiled at them; they indeed gained condence. In
8.12 we take the verb as the jussive in the protasis of a conditional sentence
(GKC, 109h, i).
188
13. On the reading aar, suggested by LXX, for MT ore, see textual note.
This is read by most commentators, but S and V support MT, which is read by
Horst. The sense of LXX is supported by v. 12.
The parallel with those who forget God indicates that n may be
derived from a verb cognate with Arab. anafa (to turn back, repudiate). The
verb is known to denote a godless, impious act in Jer. 3.1; Ps. 106.38; Isa.
10.6; etc., and is known in Ugaritic in the phrase np lb of a reprobate
(Gordon UT 3 Aqht rev. 17). A cognate in Syriac denotes pagans most of
whom to the Syrian church were Arabs, hence the word may have been used
by Muhammad to distinguish Muslims who claimed spiritual descent from
Abraham and Ishmael, whom Muhammad declared as the rst of the unafu.
The initial guttural will be noticed as distinct from of the cognate we
propose for the Hebrew word. It must be remembered, however, that Arab.
unafu in the Quran is a loanword from Syriac.
14. If this verb is original, which is denied by Stevenson, MT yq is either an
intransitive verb, either an Aram. form of Heb. q, a byform of qa (to cut
off; cf. Arab qaa, to cut off short), as Weiser proposes, or, as is more
likely in view of the gure in the second colon, a noun. Tur-Sinai proposed
that yq is a cognate of Arab. wq (a depression where water gathers), so
a puddle quickly evaporating, but this is not a good parallel to the spiders web
in v. 14b. Duhm proposed qrm (spiders webs) after Isa. 59.5ff.; Budde,
wishing to retain q of MT, read qr qayi (spiders webs in summer), taking
qayi as the Aram. form of Heb. qayi. Nearer MT is Peterss reading qiur
qayi for MT aer yq, meaning summer bands; cf. Sommerfaden and
Saadyas Arab. ablus -ami (sun cord); so Hlscher, Horst, Fohrer. For
the general sentiment, cf. Quran, Surah 29.40 (The Spider, al-ankabt; cf.
Heb. akk), quoted by DriverGray, who compare the faith of polytheists
to a spiders web for frailty; cf. 27.18; Isa. 59.5.
15. If this is original and not, as Budde and Hlscher maintained, a gloss on v.
14b, b may signify his family rather than his house.
19. The gure of a plant in vv. 16-18 is elaborated in a self-contained strophe.
The gure of the spiders web, like the others in vv. 11-12 and 16-18, is best
rounded off by a general truth pointing the comparison with the fate of the
wicked; hence it probably ends with the displaced v. 19.
MT me, joy (so V, T and Bickell, Peake, DriverGray), if correct, would
be ironical. The more natural sense is destruction, as suggested by LXX,
which indicates the reading meh, or perhaps dissolution (mess) (Beer,
Hlscher, Horst). More particularly Dhorme suggests that MT may mean
eaten with maggots, the root or ss being cognate with Arab. a (to be
eaten with maggots), which has an Akk. cognate.
For MT yim, for which one Heb. MS reads the singular (so LXX and S),
the singular should probably be read. The plural of MT is barely admissible on
the understanding that the subject ar is a collective singular; cf. Ezek 28.3,
1
The Book of Job
189
where, however, the text is suspect. In cases of the collective singular with
plural verb cited in GKC, 145d the nouns other than in Job 8.19 and Ezek.
28.3 are categories naturally understood as collective singulars.
16. The abrupt change of gure indicates a new strophe. lipen here mean
exposed to rather than before the sun (sc. sunrise). Either sense is comprehensible. The verbal root ra is found meaning to be wet in 24.8, but the
Arab. cognate means to be fresh, e.g. ripe dates.
In this passage there has been much difference of opinion. We would
emphasize the reference to the hold (yeezeh) of the plants roots on stones
(anm) or stone-heap (gal), as in Gen. 31.46, 48, 51, 52; Josh. 7.26; 8.29;
2 Sam 18.17. We propose that gann refers not to garden, but enclosed yard,
of the Oriental house, in which the plant has taken root (its yarn), where
there would be no cultivated ground. The fortuitous growth is further suggested
by the verb yesubb; cf. srm sebum tangled thorns (Nah. 1.10). Mutatis
mutandis the gure might signify the same as the seed sown on stony ground
in the parable. On this interpretation lipen eme, before the sun is up, as
Dhorme proposed, is possible, though we admit the ambiguity of the phrase.
18. The conditional clause is suspect (so Stevenson), and the rst two letters
aleph and mem may be the fragment of pim (suddenly), which the meter
would support. LXXA, if one swallow it up, supports MT, but cf. Theod., S
and V, overpowers, which seems to suggest the root bal. bla, however, is
attested in the sense to overwhelm, or destroy, and may be the cognate of
Arab. balaa, to reach, with aggressive nuance. The verb is found in the Piel
as here in parallelism with hi (to destroy) in 2 Sam 20.19f.
The subject of ki (to deny) is its place.
21. On the text, see textual note.
Though the assertions of Bildad are the general statements of Wisdom, the
opening couplet indicates that Jobs questioning of the theodicy is in his mind.
Even the hope that he holds out to Job (vv. 6f.) is conditional upon his sincere
piety. Bildads address abates nothing of the rm dogma of sin and retribution,
virtue and reward, as emphasized by the inclusio in vv. 3, 20-22. In the nal
colon vv. 20-22 the parallel ney // rem alludes to the critics of the
sufferer, who is assumed to have incurred the wrath of God, which they abet,
for example, in Ps. 21.9 (EVV 8). More particularly, both negative and positive
aspects of the theodicy are emphasized, as in the assurances at the end of the
Plaint of the Sufferer as the person falsely accused, namely the nal
encouraging oracle (v. 21; cf. Ps. 142.8 [EVV 7]) and the condemnation of the
sufferers critics or opponents (20, 22), which may be amplied by a curse
(e.g. Pss. 5.11ff. [EVV 9ff.]; 6.11 [EVV 10]; 141.8f. [EVV 7f.]).
Job 9 and 10
JOBS SECOND REJOINDER
This is arranged in three parts: 9.1-24, on the theme of the transcendence of

God; 9.25-35, Jobs despairing allegation of Gods inaccessibility; and 10.122, where Job accuses God of indifference to the sense and purpose of his own
creation or of hostility, and anticipates his challenge to God to hear his case
(ch. 31).
The passages 9.2-24 and 10.1-22 are composed each of ve strophes of
unequal length, 9.2-4, 5-10, 11-14, 15-21 and 22-24, and 10.1-2, 3-7, 8-12, 1317 and 18-22, and the intervening section 9.25-35 of three strophes, 9.25-28,
29-31 and 32-35.
The statement is introduced in the style of controversy at law or in the
Wisdom schools (9.2-4). Job then cites a Hymn of Praise on the subject of
Gods Omnipotence and transcendence, where his exploits and properties are
characteristically introduced by participles (9.5-10).
This introduces the more particular statement in the dialectic of the LawCourt and Wisdom school on Gods inaccessibility in moral issues (9.11-14),
particularly in Jobs individual case (9.15-21), which provokes the allegation
of Gods arbitrary disposition (9.22-24). Jobs weakness by contrast is presented with the accumulation of sufferings in a series of gures in the literary
convention of the Plaint of the Sufferer (9.25-28, 29-31), while 9.32-35
resumes the theme of the inaccessibility of God and anticipates Jobs appeal
for direct confrontation and hearing. The theme of an appeal for a hearing is
continued in 10.1-2. Job objects to the indifference of God to humans as the
object of His own creation and to the compulsive censoriousness which is
more human than divine (10.3-7). The former theme in 10.3-7 is developed in
the next strophe (10.8-12) and the latter in 10.13-17. The last strophe (10.1822) resumes the theme of Jobs opening statement (esp. 3.11ff.), where he
questions Gods purpose in creating and sustaining the life of a man destined
to misery; and wishes for relief in the remainder of his life before the ultimate
oblivion of death.
The Book of Job
Chapter 9
1.
Then Job answered, and said:
2.
Truly I acknowledge that this is so.

Yea, how can mere man maintain his right against God?
If he pleased to contend with him
(A man) could not answer him one (charge) in a thousand.
Be he wise in heart or strong in might,
Who has stubbornly opposed him with impunity?
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
He it is who removes mountains and they are not left undisturbed,1

Who overturns them in his anger;
Who shakes the earth from its place,
And its pillars quake;
Who commands the sun and it does not shine,
And seals up the stars;
Who stretches out the heavens Himself
And treads on the back of Sea;
Who makes the Bear and Orion,2
And the Pleiades and the Chambers of the South;
Who does great things beyond investigation,
Yea, wonders beyond number.
Lo, he passes by me and I see Him3 not,
Passes on4 and I perceive Him not.
If he shatters, then who5 shall restore?
Who can say to him, What are you doing?
A god could not turn back his anger,
Under him bow the champions of Rahab.
How much less then could I answer him
And choose my arguments with him?
Since, though in the right, I should not be answered;6
I should have to supplicate my opponent;7
If I were to cite him and he to answer me,
I have no condence that he would really listen to what I have to say,
For he would buffet me with a tempest,
And redouble my blows without cause.
He does not let me recover my breath,
But he gives me my ll of bitterness.
If it be a matter of strength he is strongest;8
And if a matter of justice, who could hold him to an appointment9?
Though I were in the right, whatever I said would convict me;
Though innocent he would make me out perverse.
10I care not for myself;
Nay, I despise my existence.
It is all one.11 So I say,
Innocent and guilty he annihilates.
191
Job 9 and 10. Jobs Second Rejoinder
192
23.
24.
When the scourge slays suddenly,

He mocks at the despair of the innocent.
The land is given into the power of the wicked,
He covers the face of the judges therein.
12
If not he, then who?
25.
13My
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
Lo,15 I will be found guilty.

Why then do I labour in vain?
Though I were to wash myself in16 soapweed
And cleanse my hands with lye,
You would plunge me in lth,17
And my clothes would abhor me.
For he is not a man like myself that I could answer,
Let us go to court together!
Would that18 there were an arbiter between us
To lay his hand on the two of us.
Let him put aside His rod from me,
And let His terror not appal me.
Then I should speak and not fear Him,
For have I not a19 clean conscience?
_
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
1
days are swifter than a courier;

They ee; I see no good.
They pass on like reed-ships,
Like a vulture swooping on its prey.
If I think,14 I will forget my trouble,
I will compose my features and smile,
I dread all my torments,
I know that you will not clear me.
Reading yu (pausal) for MT y (see Commentary ad loc.)

Reading esl, assuming the omission of w before k in the Old Heb. script.
Reading erh for MT ereh with S and V.
Reading yaal for MT weyaal with two Heb. MSS.
Reading m for MT m with T and several Heb. MSS.
Reading neh with LXX, Theod. and S. See Commentary ad loc.
Conjecturing leaal mip for MT limeoe. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading amm h for MT amm hinn.
Reading yenn for MT yn after LXX and S.
Omitting tm-n as a dittograph. See Commentary ad loc.
LXX omits aa h of MT which, however, is necessary to the meter, the couplet
being 4:4.
Reading im-l h m for MT im-l m-h, though this may be a gloss.
Omitting MT we as a dittograph before y in the last stage of the Heb. script before
the nal form of the square script.
Reading mart for MT omer with LXX, T and one Heb. MS.
Reading hn n for MT n, metri causa.
Reading bem for MT bemw.
The Book of Job
193
17. Reading beu (orthographic variant of su) for MT beaa. See Commentary
ad loc.
18. Reading l or l with LXX, S and several Heb. MSS for MT l.
19. Perhaps reading k hal n n imm for MT k l-n, assuming the
omission of h by haplography after y in the Old Heb. script. See Commentary ad
loc.
2. In Jobs argument mah-yyidaq en im-l should be taken in the sense,
What shall a (mere) man adduce to maintain his right against God?, thus
sustaining the legal idiom and understanding that Job is controversially adapting Bildads thesis of the justice (eeq) of God (8.3). Here, in view of Jobs
statement of the might, majesty and transcendence of God (vv. 5-14), the
choice of en emphasizes the weakness of humanity; cf. na in Isa. 17.11;
Jer. 15.18; Ps. 69.21 (EVV 20); Job 34.6; with Ass. and Arab. cognates. The
adversative force of im and the forensic sense of yidaq is supported by the
phrase lr imm in v. 3.
3. yap, as in 13.3; 21.14; 33.32; Deut. 25.7f.; 1 Kgs 9.1, means is pleased
to, with the nuance of condescension as in Est. 6.5.The couplet is formally
ambiguous. NEB renders If a man chooses to argue with him God will not
answer him one question in a thousand. This might be supported by Gods
long-deferred answer to Jobs complaint and challenge in the Divine
Declaration (38.1ff.) and by the fact that there God does not give the expected
answer to Jobs problem but a rebuke. If we take God as the subject of v. 3a,
which the regular meaning of yap (choose, be pleased to) would suggest,
condescending to the confrontation (r) for which Job longs, the inability of a
human to answer one question in a thousand might be instanced by the
plethora of questions in the Divine Declaration which bafe Job. Under this
consideration we prefer the latter interpretation.
4. hiqh, lit. to make hard, sc. re (neck), means to make difculties
(Exod. 13.15).
5. Verses 5-14, on the subject of the transcendence of God in Creation and in
the great catastrophes in nature, has, with the participles, the hall-mark of a
Hymn of Praise to the Almighty. It is then not unapt to Jobs complaint that
God is beyond contention in a humans plea for justice (vv. 2-5, 15ff.), and, to
be sure, the theme and style of the Hymn of Praise is used in the addresses of
Jobs three friends in support of their argument for the sovereignty of God in
society (5.9ff., Eliphaz; 11.7ff., Zophar; 25.2, Bildad) and, more extensively,
in the Elihu addendum (36.22ff.; 37.1ff.). The form may be used ironically by
Job in his arguments against his friends. When that is said, however, formally
and thematically it interrupts Jobs argument in legal style in vv. 2-4, 15ff., so
1
194
that it may be a secondary insertion. Some such explanation is suggested by

the fact that vv. 5-7 on the destructive activity of the Almighty, preceded the
passage on the positive aspect of His creation in vv. 8-10, which Fohrer
(p. 205) takes as possibly two separate fragments of Hymns of Praise. The
passage certainly seems secondary, perhaps suggested by the original in
vv. 11-14 and particularly v. 12, If he shatters then who shall restore?, which
may have been elaborated in vv. 5-7, and the passage on Gods power over
Rahab, the force of chaos par excellence in v. 13, which may have been elaborated in vv. 8-10. Alternatively, in pursuance of the theme of the transcendence
of God in vv. 2-4, the author may have used a hymn of praise (vv. 8-10); cf.
Psalm 104 and the doxologies in Amos 4.13, 5.8f.; 9f., and 5-7 in that order,
which was subsequently reversed by a redactor through motives of reverence,
like the orthodox conclusion to Ecclesiastes (12.13f.).
aq in Classical Hebrew means to move on (intrans.) and in Arab. and
Aram. to grow old. It is found in the Qal in 14.18 and 16.4 and in the Hiphil
as here of mountains being moved. The subject of y (pausal) is uncertain.
If personal and indenite, it might indicate the removal of the mountains
beyond human powers of anticipation or detection of where they had once
stood. The plural, however, suggests rather the subject hrm. In that case as a
complement to heeq the verb may rather be cognate of Arab. wadaa, to
leave, sc. undisturbed (as a horse given free rein), cited by W. Johnstone
(1991: 54f.) from Lane on the basis of native Arab lexicographers.
ha is used of drastic overturning, for example, the destruction of Sodom
and Gomorrah (Amos 4.11) and similar catastrophes.
raz is used of earthquake in 1 Sam. 14.15, Amos 8.8 and Isa. 14.16,
where it is parallel to ra, the regular word for the quaking of the earth. The
conception of the earth propped on pillars over the lower deep (tehm) is
familiar in Ps. 75.4, where the pillars are said to be kept rm by God; cf. Job
26.11, where the sky also is propped by cosmic pillars. The verb pla occurs
only here in the OT, though derivatives are found, e.g. pall, shuddering
(Job 21.5; Isa. 21.4; Ezek. 7.18; Ps. 55.6), milee, something to shudder at,
Maacahs cult symbol, perhaps a scribal parody of misele, a graven image
(1 Kgs 15.13), and tilee, horror (Jer. 49.16).
eres is a rare word, found in the OT only here and doubtfully at Judg.
14.18 and in the place-names Timnat-eres in Judg. 2.9 (cf. Josh. 19.20, where
the corruption sera indicates the consciousness of the scribes that ares
meant sun, with associations with a pagan nature-cult at the locality), and
har-eres (Judg. 1.35), with probably this association with sun-worship, and
the Ascent of eres in Transjordan in Judg. 8.13.
mar in hmr has probably the Arab. connotation to command. The
obscuration of the sun may be the result of eclipse or of the dust-laden sirocco,
peculiarly the accompaniment of the theophany of Yahweh as the God of the
desert mountain in Sinai.
1
The Book of Job
195
8. In nh mayim the conception is that of stretching out the heavens as the
web of a tent is pegged out by Bedouin and stretched on its poles, called in
Arab. awmid (lit. pillars); cf. the pillars (ammm) of the earth in v. 6b.
The phrase stretches out the heavens himself is reiterated with slight
variation in Isa. 44.24.
For MT ym some Heb. MSS have (cloud). In Heb. bm means
humps usually of earth, such as grave-mounds, or literally backs of humans
or animals (Deut. 33.29). Here we should see a reminiscence of the triumph of
Baal over the unruly waters in Canaanite mythology, the Canaanite version of
the triumph of God over the powers of Chaos and His assumption of kingship
which guarantees His Order in nature, which belonged to the liturgy of the
autumn festival, and was adapted by Israel in Enthronement Psalms. The
specic reference is to the victor setting his foot on the back of the prone
enemy, and Marduks treading upon the legs of the vanquished Tiamat in the
cosmic conict in the Babylonian New Year myth may here be cited.
The image of God treading on the back of Sea or on the summit of the waves may recall the stele of Baal at Ras Shamra, where the god strides out over
two registers of undulations, symbolizing perhaps his victory over the waters,
now consigned to the sky and under the earth (Schaeffer 1939: pl. xxiii, g. 2;
J. Gray 1964: pl. 28, pp. 127ff., 230).
9. Compare the doxology on the subject of Gods creation and ordering of the
constellations in Amos 5.8, in support of his general theme of Gods sustaining of the moral order, which the prophet understands in the context of His
theophany as King and the whole related ideology of the autumn festival. Here
it must be noted that LXX reverses the order of the constellations and kesl
under the inuence of 38.1-32 and Amos 5.8, where the rst constellation to
be named is kmh, then kesl, the fool (cf. 8.14; 31.24) or Orion, called by
the Arabs the Giant (al-Jabbr). is rendered in Arab. by Saadya as bant
an-naa (Daughters of the Cofn), which signied for the Arabs the Great
and the Little Bears. The Chambers of the South (aer mn; cf. 37.9), the
place from which the whirlwind comes, is rendered the intimate places of the
South in T. G.R. Driver (1956b) connects eer with the root to encircle
(Ezek. 21.19) and sees a reference to circulus Austrinus.
kmh is rendered by LXX here and at 38.31 as Pleiades and so by Sym.
and T. In Amos 5.6, Sym. and Theod. render it by the same term. In the
present passage Saadya renders it arya, lit. the wet (constellation), i.e. the
Pleides. The word is taken generally to signify a cluster of stars like a herd of
camels (Arab. kmatu[n]), but in 38.31 Do you bind the bonds of kmh?
Dhorme proposes to see a word-play between bind and the root kmu, known
in Ass. in the meaning to tie; cf. kimtu (family). The Pleiades herald the
season of cold weather and the vital winter rains in Palestine, and hence are a
manifestation of Gods positive Order.
1
196
10. In view of the limitations of humans vis--vis the might and method of the
Creator (vv. 10f.) the worthy sufferer complains that he cannot expect
vindication by the canons of human justice (vv. 11-22, 25-32). It seems to Job
in his cumulative and unmitigated suffering that God is susceptible neither to
justice or mercy (v. 15), and in mocking the sufferings of the innocent,
encourages the abuse of human rights (v. 24), and sets a precedent for the rule
of might over right. The wrath of God, from whom one might expect mercy if
not justice (5.17ff.), is signicantly emphasized in v. 13, being instanced in the
vast destruction by God in his own Creation in what we regard as the obverse
of the Hymn of Praise in vv. 8-10 and 5-7 in that order. The conclusion of
Jobs vehement statement of the indifference of God to good or evil in society
(vv. 22-24) is tantamount to blasphemy, to which Job commits himself in full
knowledge that it is a capital offence (v. 21).
12. The verb a occurs in the OT only here and in the nominal form ee
in Prov. 23.28, where it describes the objective of the lurking adulteress.
Hence it is taken to mean prey, but that seems to assume a connection with
Arab. aafa (to snatch), which actually has a Heb. cognate a (Judg.
21.21; Ps. 10.9). In Job, however, the verb is not a but a. This
suggests the Syr. cognate att (to break in pieces); cf. Arab. atfu(n)
(death, or dissolution), and hence our translation he shatters. Who can then
restore? If the ending -enn in MT yeenn is the pronominal sufx rather
than the energic ending the sense would be Who could turn God back (from
his purpose)?
13. Verse 13b is a citation from the mythology of the conict of Cosmos and
Chaos from the liturgy of the autumn festival. The Mesopotamian myth
relating to the spring New Year festival at Babylon celebrated the triumph of
Marduk over Tiamat, the monster of the lower deep and its allies (ru). raha
is one of the monsters which menace Gods Cosmos in the Psalms and
Prophets in the OT, for example, Ps. 89.10f. (EVV 9f.), where, as in Job 26.12,
it is parallel to Sea (ym), Isa. 51.9, where it is parallel to tannn in the same
connection, and Isa. 30.7, where it is used guratively for Babylon and Egypt
respectively, the historical expression of the forces of Chaos. The fact that
among the other enemies of Cosmos in the Ras Shamra texts raha is not
named may indicate that it was an appellation of Sea, the arch-enemy of Order
in Canaanite and Hebrew, meaning the Agitated One; cf. Aram. reha (to be
agitated), with Syr. and Arab. cognates meaning to tremble, usually through
fear, and Akk. rabu (to be irritated). The allies of Rahab indicates
familiarity with the Mesopotamian myth Enuma elish from the liturgy of the
Babylonian New Year festival, where Tiamat created as allies the hydra, the
red dragon, the laamu, the great lion, the wolf with the foaming mouth, the
scorpion man, raging tempests, the sh man, the horned goat and others.
1
The Book of Job
197
15. On the readings neh and baal mip, with forensic connotations like
vv. 2-4, see textual note.
16. Job declares that if God did deign to answer He would do so on his own
terms without particular reference to his questions. This is what actually
happens in the Divine Declaration in 38.240.14. Note again the technical
terms of a law-suit, qr (to cite) and nh (to respond).
17. The root is well attested in Heb. (e.g. Gen. 3.5) and in Aram., meaning
to beat, bruise. erh, if correct, must be an orthographic variant of serh;
cf. Nah. 1.3, where the way of Yahweh is in the whirlwind (sh) and storm
(erh), the demonstration of the wrath of God in natural catastrophes. In
the present passage there may be an allusion to Bildads reference to Jobs
vehement protest as a great bluster, mighty wind (8.2). NEB renders
bierh as for a trie (lit. for a single hair) which might be supported by
without cause (innm) in the parallel colon.
19. On the reading yenn see textual note. The verb means hold him to an
appointment, or confrontation; cf. 24.1.
20. My mouth (p) means my speech, or whatever I said, and is the
subject of yarn (would convict me), though probably not of wayyaqen
(would make me out perverse) in v. 20b. Jobs statement in v. 3b though
innocent He would make me out perverse is his retort to Bildads rhetorical
question, Does the Almighty pervert the right (eeq)? (8.3).
21. MT tm-an may be repeated from v. 20b by scribal error; the second
colon, moreover, is short of a beat, so Hlscher and Horst propose to insert
daqt or addq an (I am right). We propose that k with the adversative
sense is omitted by haplography after - in na in the Old Heb. script,
restoring the text:
l a na
k emas ayyy
I care not for myself;

Nay, I despise my existence.
ya meaning to care for, to take special note of is attested in Gen. 39.6;
Deut. 33.9; Amos 3.2; Ps. 31.8 (EVV 7).
22. al-kn indicates that in his desperate case, with nothing to lose, Job will
dare to assert that God deals indiscriminately with the good and the bad. The
phrase is omitted by Duhm as a gloss (so also Stevenson).
23. means lash; cf. Arab. awu(n), hence Latin plague. Beer suspected
this reading and suggested i (his rod) after S, denoting the rulers
sceptre, which signalled life or death; cf. Est. 5.2.
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198
massa may be derived from nsh (to try) or from msas (to melt or be
destroyed). The parallelism indicates the latter. The Niphal of msas is used
with the subject heart denoting despair (e.g. Josh. 2.11).
24. On the text of v. 24c, ser, see textual note.
26. im, with or, as regularly in Ugaritic and occasionally in Heb. against,
is used of comparison occasionally in Ugaritic (e.g. Gordon UT 49.I.23) and in
Classical Heb. (e.g. 37.18; 40.15; Pss. 73.5; 106.6).
eh, hapax legomenon in the OT, has an Ass. cognate abu, denoting
papyrus, which is supported by kel gme (vessels of papyrus) in Isa. 18.2.
The speed of the craft suggests skiffs in the Nile current rather than ships,
though sailing ships of bundles of papyrus reeds are attested in Egyptian
sculpture and painting and by Thor Heyerdahls experiment with the Ra.
neer is either the vulture or the eagle, like Arab. niru(n).
is a hapax legomenon in the OT, but is found in Late Heb., Aram. and
Syr. s (to y), of which it may be a dialectic variant. The reference may be
either to the deceptively swift gliding ight of the eagle or vulture, or its
coming immediately from the incredible distance from which it spies carrion.
27. On the reading mart, here I think, see textual note.
If eezeh pnay formally might mean will leave (off) my (sad) face, the
reference would be to scowling; cf. Cains scowling brows in Gen. 4.6. But the
verb may be a homonym, meaning to prepare, here in the sense compose,
e.g. Neh. 3.8, with a cognate in Ugaritic db (so Dahood 1959: 303-309). It
may alternatively be an unknown Classical Heb. word meaning to sweeten
cognate with Arab. auba, used in this sense in the IV form, the phrase thus
meaning I put on a cheerful countenance (so G.R. Driver 1955: 76), which
would also be feasible in the context.
bla (cf. 10.20) is cognate with Arab. balaja, of faces beaming on
acquittal in the Quran; cf. Ps. 39.14.
28. gr is a strong verb meaning to fear, be in terror of (transitive); cf. 3.25.
29. On the reading hn n see textual note.
er is used in the forensic sense, I am guilty, and not in the moral sense,
I am wicked.
30. ele, which normally means snow, so understood by S and T, cf. Qere
bem ele (in snow water), probably means rather soap-weed, Akk.
aslaku, Mishnaic Heb. ela (Preuss 1923: 431; Lw 1924: I, 648f.). br,
from the root brar (to be pure) is here a substance known as cleansel in Isa.
1.25 (cf. br in Jer. 2.22), which was made from the ashes of certain plants,
possibly mixed with olive oil, which was known in Mesopotamia c. 2000 BCE
1
The Book of Job
199
(so Dhorme [1910: 111], citing Thureau-Dangin). Mowinckel (1955: 311)

proposes that there is a reference to a rite of exculpation; cf. Deut. 21.6; Ps.
26.6; 73.13; MT 27.24; but in such a context as the present the language is
gurative.
31. On the reading beu, preferred to MT baaa (in the pit) by
Hoffmann, Beer, Duhm, Ehrlich, Dhorme, Hlscher, Stevenson, Horst and
Fohrer after LXX, see textual note. The word may be an orthographic variant of
sh (offal) in Isa. 5.25.
33. MT l y is suspect, there is not being normally expressed by ayin;
hence with LXX, S and many Heb. MSS and most commentators. l (would
that) may be read. MT, however, is retained by V, T, Dhorme, Hlscher,
Weiser, Horst and Fohrer.
ma denotes normally a judge, who gives an impartial verdict strictly
according to the norm of justice, with the implication of reproof and punishment of the guilty party. Here it denotes an arbiter. Strahan (1914: 102) sees
here an unconscious prophecy of incarnation and atonement, where he does
well to qualify his statement by unconscious.
35. MT k l-n n imm has never been satisfactory to commentators,
though it was evidently unquestioned in the ancient versions. Dhorme
proposed to transpose the two cola, reading,
Since it is not thus (sc. since there is no arbiter)
I will reason with myself and not fear,
transposing n imm from the end of v. 35b to the beginning of v. 35a,

which upsets the meter. Fohrer retains MT, but assumes that n is a
doctrinal adjustment of an original h (1989: 200), For he does not deal
rightly with me. A simple explanation would be to assume the scribal omission of an original interrogative h after y in k in the Old Heb. script, and to
take kn, as Fohrer does, as an adjective true; cf. Gen. 42.11, 19, 31, 33, 34;
Exod. 10.29; 2 Kgs 7.9; etc.; thus we should read k hal n n imm
(For am I not true with myself?, i.e. Have I not a clear conscience?).
Chapter 10
Jobs Second Rejoinder (Continued)
In utmost desperation, taking his life into his hand in Heb. idiom (cf. 9.21),
Job, condent of his innocence (10.7), presses his plea directly to God in 9.2831, demanding the specic charges against him (v. 2b) though, before God
transcendent he has no hope of an adequate hearing (9.3f.) as in human court
guaranteed by an arbiter (9.33). Jobs afiction before regular condemnation
after a fair hearing is surely an abuse of Gods marvellous, superhuman power
1
200
(10.16f.). Beyond human limitations (vv. 4f.), God might be expected to

transcend justice in mercy, it may be implied, rather than acting like an overzealous inquisitor (vv. 4-6), like the n of the Prologue, to which the
passage may obliquely refer.
The detailed passage on the conception and birth of a mortal as a manifestation of Gods creative activity (vv. 8-12), the object of Gods visitation
(pequh), here in the sense of Gods special benecence, may be taken as the
application to the individual of the theme of the Hymn of Praise to the Creator
of inanimate nature in 9.8-10, while His unrelenting and intensied afiction
of a man like Job (10.8, 17) seems a similar application of the same theme in
its negative aspect (9.5-7)which might justify the view that the citation of
the Hymn of Praise in 9.5-7 and 8-10 may be indeed from the author of the
Book of Job adapted to suit his theme. The sufferings of the innocent in fact
seem for Job to negate any positive purpose in Gods creation of humanity
(v. 3), while the withholding of mercy to the limited extent to which the
worthy sufferer seeks it (v. 20) only sharpens his argument. In view of the
limited prospect of the after-life in the Book of Job (vv. 21f.), beyond the
interest or inuence of God, the suffering of the blameless without relief or
vindication seems to make nonsense of an honest person as the noblest work
of God (cf. vv. 18-22). If this is the end of the life of humans with their
potential and will for good, like Job in happier times (ch. 29), Job may well reecho the curse of the day of his birth (vv. 18f.; cf. ch. 3).
Chapter 10
Jobs Second Rejoinder (Continued)
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
1
My inmost being loathes1 my life;

I shall give free scope to my complaint,
I shall speak in my bitterness of soul,
I will say to God, Do not condemn me.
Inform me of your case against me.
Do you like to oppress me,
that you spurn your own hands labour?
(And shine on the purpose of the ungodly.)2
Have you eyes of esh,
Do you see as man sees?
Are your days as the days of mankind?
Are your years as the years of a man,
That you subject my iniquity to your inquisition
And seek out my sin,
Though you know that I am not guilty,
and that there is none to deliver (me) from your hand?
Your hands have knit me together and nished me,
And after that3 you have turned4 and overwhelmed me.
Remember that it was of5 clay you made me,
The Book of Job

10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
201
And back to dust you will return me.

Did you not pour me out like milk,
Curdling me like cheese,6
Clothing me with skin and esh,
With a framework of bones and sinews?
You have invested me with life,7
And your special visitation has preserved the spirit within me.
But these things you laid up in your heart,
I know that this was your intention,
If I defaulted you would have me in custody,
And would not clear me of my sin;
If I were guilty, woe betide me!
Or if innocent, I may not lift my head,
8(Sated with humiliation and lled9 with afiction,
And if [my head] were raised up proudly you would hunt me like a lion
And renew your prodigious exploits against me.)8
Your renew your attack10 against me,
And intensify your anger against me;
And you send in fresh forces11 against me.
So why did you bring me forth from the womb?
Would that I had expired and eye had not seen me!
I should have been as if I had not existed,
Should have been carried from the womb to the grave.
Are not the days of my life12 few?
Desist13 from me that I may have a little cheer
Before I go, never to return,
To a land of darkness and gloom
A land of thick darkness [ ],14
The shining of which is as blackness.

Reading nqah for MT nqeh, from qa, possibly a byform of q.
Though an occasional tricolon is used in a predominant arrangement of bicola in
Heb. and Ugaritic poetry, this is probably a later gloss.
3. Reading aar with LXX and S for MT yaa, being corrupted to y in the Old
Hebraic script and r to d at this or a later stage.
4. Reading sabb or the innitive absolute s for MT s.
5. Reading mmer for MT kamer (like clay), assuming the corruption of m to k
in the Old Hebraic script.
6. Reading genh for MT geinnh.
7. Reading ayym att imm for MT ayym wese imm, metri causa.
See Commentary ad loc.
8. Probably to be omitted as a secondary expansion which impairs the argument.
9. MT reh may be genuine, rh being a byform of rwh (to be sated). See
Commentary ad loc.
10. Reading eye for MT ey (your witnesses). See Commentary ad loc.
1.
2.
202
11. Reading wetaal e imm for MT al we imm. See Commentary ad

loc.
12. Reading yem eld for MT ymay yedl. See Commentary ad loc.
13. Reading e for MT ye. See Commentary ad loc.
14. Omitting kem pel almwe as a secondary expansion.
1. On the reading nqah see textual note.
nee means life or, as in Arab. very self, which is the meaning
demanded here since my life (ayyay) is the object.
za in the sense let go free, recurring in 20.13, recalls Exod. 23.5 (E)
and the original ritual or legal phrase r wez (restricted and free) in
Deut. 32.36; 1 Kgs 14.20f.; 2 Kgs 9.18; 14.26. The Ugaritic cognate db is
used of releasing a hawk in the Ras Shamra Legend of Aqht (Gordon UT 3
Aqht 22f.).
3. aq, which means commonly in the OT to oppress, gave offence to
Jewish scribes as a divine activity, and the MT k-aaq was read as that I am
wicked by Aq. and LXX in the texts they translated. The verb means also to
act violently. As the predicate of river in 40.23, it is cited by Dhorme,
assuming that it refers to the river in ood, yea kappey (lit. toil of your
hands) implies achievement with labour and pains as distinct from maaeh,
which signies achievement; cf. Isa. 41.4, m-al weh (Who wrought
and achieved?); cf. h used of creation in Ps. 95.6 and specically of the
creation of humanity in Ps. 119.73 and Genesis 1.
ha with God as subject describes His epiphany (Deut. 33.2) as effective
ruler () in Ps. 94.1; cf. Pss. 50.7; 80.2 (EVV 1). With the traditional
implication of the vindication of Gods people and the imposition of his Order
it has peculiar point here in the case of Job, who thus rebukes God for intervening in support of those whom he should particularly have condemned. Here
the noun h is ambiguous, meaning plan or purpose or, as in the Qumran
Manual of Discipline, party.
6. biqq, which usually means in Classical Heb. to seek, has here the
meaning rather to examine or inspect, with the nuance of inquisition.
le in laawn is probably the nota accusativa, as in Aram.
7. al in this context means although, despite.
Commentators have found no parallelism in this bicolon, and so Beer and
Duhm propose to emend MT wen miyye mal (there is none to rescue
me from your hand) to wen bey mal (there is no perdy in my hand),
which is just graphically feasible though doubtful. Ehrlich sought to restore
the parallelism he assumed by emending era in v. 7a to ewwa, which is
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graphically more feasible, reading al dae k-l ewwa (Though you

know that I cannot save myself). But with Fohrer we should retain MT, taking
the bicolon, admittedly and exceptionally not in the usual parallelism, in the
whole context of Jobs argument in the rst strophe, particularly vv. 3ff., the
point of which is that God was not bound to act as a human, punishing sin
automatically, but had scope for mercy, even when persons might not be able
to prove their innocence to his satisfaction. Job suggests that the mere fact that
God had created humanity suggests a more positive purpose, which is belied
by summary visitation. This is implied in v. 7b, which hints at the mercy of
God since the sufferer has no other help.
8. a, the preliminary of h, the nished work of creation of humanity
(see above on v. 3), suggests a connection with aabbm (graven images),
and an Arab. cognate aaba has been suggested (BDB); but Heb. does not
correspond phonetically to Arab. , and so this etymology must be rejected.
The correspondence is with Arab. aaba and Syr. ea, both used of a
surgeon binding up a limb (so Ball and KoehlerBaumgartner). Hence we
agree with Fohrer in his rendering you have knit me together, at which he
arrived by the analogy of the creation of humans in v. 11 clothed with esh in
a (binding) framework of bones and sinews.
On the reading aar sabb (or s), see textual notes. Dhormes
suggestion, however, should be noted, that s means utterly, citing 19.10.
9. On the reading mmer (of clay) see textual note. For the conception of
humans as moulded from clay, cf. 33.6; for mer (clay) parallel to r in
the constitution of humans, cf. 4.19, and for their return to the dust, cf. Gen.
3.19.
10. geinnh (cheese) is not elsewhere attested in Classical Heb., but its
cognates Aram. gun and Arab. jubnu(n) are well known.
The narrative imperfect in tattn and taqpn, with the force of the
Greek aorist and the force and form of the Akk. preterite, is regularly used in
the Ugaritic myths and legends.
11. s (constructing a framework) is used in the same connection in the
Qal in Ps. 139.13.
12. The phrase h ese im (to deal kindly with) is familiar, but h
ayym is strange, and ayym is suspect; cf. the various proposals to emend.
Beers proposal, followed by G.B. Gray, to read n (grace) for MT ayym,
is the most feasible and is supported by the collocation of n and ese in
Est. 2.17. MT is read by Dhorme, Stevenson, Hlscher and Horst. The meter
demands one word fewer, however, and LXX you set for MT suggests
the reading att, which would take ayym as the object. ese may then be
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secondary, perhaps suggested by imm, involving the change of att to

(so Lindblom). Alternatively it is suggested that the compound phrase
ese imm should be retained and ayym taken in apposition to
ese (so Dhorme and others). This leaves the difculty of the overloaded
colon.
pequddh means a visitation or special note taken here in kindness, though
often in wrath and retribution.
The spirit in humans, preserved by Gods special visitation (pequddh), is
Gods special gift which peculiarly gives humans afnity with God; cf. Isa.
31.5. See on 6.4.
13. im denotes intimacy; cf. im lea dwi the purpose of David (1 Kgs
8.17).
14. mar here is used not in the sense of protection, but of marking or
detaining in custody.
15. alelay is probably interjectional, derived from a root lal, probably
onomatopoeic, with an Arab. cognate, to moan (in sickness). It occurs only
here and at Mic. 7.1. The raising of the head may signify deance (Judg. 8.28;
Ps. 83.3), pardon (11.15) or relief, as here; cf. the Baal myth of Ras Shamra
(Gordon UT 137.23, 27), where the gods lower their heads on their knees in
discomture and raise them in relief. reh on (cf. MT ony, with dittography
of y) recalls Ben Sira 34.28, yayin niteh b re (wine drunk at the right
time and to satiety), in Prov. 23.31, al-tre yayin k yiaddm (do not drink
wine to satiety when it is red), and probably Prov. 31.4, where reh is parallel
to e (drinking) (Thomas 1962: 499f.); cf. Gordon UT nt I.12-15: bk rb
m ri, a large goblet of mighty draught. In the light of this evidence reh
may well be genuine rather than rewh with the same meaning, which has been
proposed.
16. And if my head exalted itself is a paraphrase of MT weyieh, which the
ancient versions read and paraphrased thus. Ball after S read weeeh (and if
I exalt myself), assuming the scribal error of y for , feasible in the Old Heb.
script. tipall is used ironically. The word implies the immediate effect of
Gods power without recourse to secondary causes for His own purpose and
glory and beyond natural processes and human understanding. Terrien has
well observed that this is an ironical reference to Gods exploits as the theme
of Hymns of Praise, as in Exod. 15.11 (cf. Ps. 77.15, and, with particular
reference to the present passage, Isa. 29.14). The verb expresses the shocking
effect of such activity.
17. eye (your attack), cognate with Arab. adiya in the II and IV forms
(to be hostile), is obviously to be read for MT ey, your witnesses (so
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Ehrlich, Dhorme, Stevenson, Steinmann, Pope). LXX reads a singular noun,

but renders examination, thus seeming to support MT witnesses. We read
weal e imm for MT al web imm, which, however, is possible assuming the omission of w before b and understanding al
(relays of forces) as the predicate of teadd (you renew). alh means a
change of clothes (Judg. 14.12) or relief from duty (14.14). The emended text
refers to the sending in successive waves of fresh troops; cf. Arab. alfatu(n)
(Khalif, successor). Note the adversative sense of im; cf. nilam im (ght
against).
18. egwa, like ehyeh and bal in v. 19, expresses a wish which should have
been fullled at a xed point of time in the past (GKC, 107n).
20. In v. 20a LXX, S and Jerome read the time of my life which suggests the
reading yem eld to Wright, Bickell, Beer, Budde, Duhm, Ehrlich, G.B.
Gray, Dhorme, Hlscher, D.W. Thomas and Fohrer for MT ymay yedl. In
v. 20b y is doubtful and various emendations have been proposed, e.g.
eh (look away), as Graetz, Beer, Ball, G.B. Gray, Hlscher, Fohrer, which
has the support of LXX, 7.19 and Ps. 39.14, ha mimmenn wealh.
Admirable as that may seem, we nd it unlikely that such a distinctive letter
as could have been corrupted to y in MT yi at any stage of the development
of the Heb. alphabet. Hence we prefer Lagardes ebo, which is graphically
feasible in the Old Heb. script.
22. This verse has been regarded as a series of glosses on a land of darkness
and deepest gloom (ere e wealmwe) in v. 21b (so Bickell, Beer,
Duhm, Hlscher, Fohrer, who limits the glosses to MT kem el almwet)
(so Budde, Oort, Dhorme, Stevenson, Horst), reducing the couplet to the
following:
ere h wel serm
watta kem-el.
h may be noted as a rare form; cf. h (Amos 4.13).

serm, if it is the plural of ser in its usual sense of order, might
indicate the ordered succession of day and night regulated by the sun; cf. Gen.
1.16-18 (P). LXX has suggested the reading nhr (so Peters) or sehrm
(celestial globes [Beer]), which, however, is only attested in post-biblical
Heb. G.R. Driver (1955: 76f.) is nearer the truth, following the clue of LXX, in
suggesting that serm is cognate with Arab. sadira (to be dazzled), taking
serm as beams of light.
Job 11
ZOPHARS FIRST ADDRESS
Zophars expostulation is arranged in six strophes which may be arranged

according to their sense as vv. 2-4, Zophars rebuke to Jobs eloquence and
moral condence; vv. 5-6, 7-9, 10-12, the assertion of Gods higher wisdom
and human inadequacy; and vv. 13-16, 17-20, the assurance of Gods grace on
repentance.
In the rst strophe the literary afnity is with the sapiential controversy;
the second uses the diction of the controversy at law; the third states the
transcendent wisdom of God in the style and diction of the Hymn of Praise;
and the fourth is cast in the literary convention of the Wisdom Psalm on the
theme of Gods cognizance of human sin. In the second part of Zophars
address the fth strophe directs an admonition particularly to Job, the literary
afnity of which is the prophetic admonition and promise of blessing. The
theme of blessing is sustained and elaborated in the last two strophes and, as a
foil, the sapiential theme of the theodicy is asserted in the statement of the
discomture of the wicked.
In asserting the transcendence of God (vv. 7-9), Zophar agrees with Job
9.11-16, 32; but, while Job deplores the inaccessibility of God in his desire for
justice, Zophar urges that the same divine transcendence does not entitle one
to dispute the sapiential doctrine of sin and retribution. Evil cannot escape
Gods notice though humans may not sufciently consider their sin (v. 11),
thus animadverting obliquely on Jobs refusal to admit sin as the cause of his
suffering. For the obtuseness of humanity in general and the mindless persons
who ignore and dispute the tenets of Hebrew Wisdom he quotes what is
possibly a proverb:
An inane man will get sense
As soon as a wild ass of the steppe may be trained as a donkey. (v. 12)
Thus Zophar urges the sapiential doctrine of retributive justice like Eliphaz
and Bildad, but more brusquely and impersonally. Like them he asserts the
positive as well as the negative aspect of the belief, with the prospect of
blessing, which like Eliphaz he holds out to Job (vv. 16-19) conditional upon
his ordering his mind (v. 13a), that is to display the traditional patience of the
wise man who controls his passion (cf. per contra 5.2) and supplicate the
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mercy of God (13b; cf. 5.8ff. and 8.5-7). Characteristic of the more rigid
Bildad and Zophar, the obverse of the blessing thus promised is the condign
punishment of the wicked (20; cf. 8.22). The encouragement of all three
friends is signicantly lacking in the rest of the dialogue except, characteristically, in the last appeal of the more mature Eliphaz (22.21-28).
Chapter 11
1.
Then Zophar the Naamathite answered and said:
2.
Must the voluble talker1 be answered?

Is a man right because he is glib?
Shall your babbling silence men,
And you scoff2 and none reproach you?
Yea, you say,3 my doctrine is pure,
And you are4 clean in our eyes.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
1
But would that God would speak,5

Might open His lips against you!
Yea, declare to you secrets of wisdom
For his immediate activity6 is related to its effect
But be certain that God will question you7about your sins.
Can you nd out the ultimate truth of God?
Can you reach the connes of the Almighty?
It is higher than the heavens.8 What can you do?
Deeper than Sheol. What can you know?
Longer than the earth in measure,
And broader than the sea.
If He arrests and connes
And arraigns who shall answer Him?
For He knows false men
And sees evil, though men do not consider that.
For an inane man will get sense
As soon as a wild ass of the steppe be trained as a donkey.9
If you settled your mind
And spread out your hands to Him,
If evil be in your hand remove it,
Nor let wrong abide in your tent,10
Then you would lift up your face stainless,
And you would be rmly established with no fear.
In that case11 you would forget trouble,
As water which has owed away you will remember it.
Darkness12 shall become as noontide,13
Thick gloom shall be as morning;
And you will be condent because there is hope,
And you will be protected,14 lying down in security;
(And you shall lie down and none shall make you afraid;)15
208
20.
Job 11. Zophars First Address

And many shall court your favour;
But the eyes of the wicked shall fail;
They will lose the means of ight,
And their hope will be the expiration of breath.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
Reading ra for MT r with LXX, Sym., V and T. See Commentary ad loc.

Reading weila for MT wattila.
Reading wemar for MT wattmer.
Reading hay for MT hay, according to the sequel. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yeabbr for MT dabbr, which is nevertheless possible.
Reading elyw for MT kilayim. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yile for MT yaeh le. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading gehh mimayim with V for MT geh mayim. See Commentary ad
loc.
Taking ayir as displaced from after pere m and reading yillm for MT
yiwwl.
Reading singular with several Heb. MSS for MT plural, but see Commentary ad loc.
Reading atth with S for MT atth.
Reading hle (pausal) for MT hle, as suggested by the parallelism. See
Commentary ad loc.
Reading keohorayim for MT miohorayim, assuming corruption of k to m in the Old
Heb. script.
Reading weuppart for MT weart.
This colon is probably a secondary expansion after Isa. 17.2 and Zeph. 3.13.
2. On the reading ra derim for MT r derm (volubility) see textual
note. The parallel eayim (the glib one) (so Pope) indicates a personal
subject.
3. baddm means babbling, possibly signifying disarticulated or incoherent
speech, if derived from Heb. b, with an Arab. cognate meaning to be
divided; cf. babbling in Isa. 16.6; Jer. 49.30.
4. For liq S reads let (my conduct). leqa is found outside Proverbs and
Job only in Deut. 32.2 and Isa. 29.24, in both cases with associations of
instruction in the formation of intelligence. In the present passage the sage
projects his own person into the character of Job, and leqa may therefore be
admitted, probably contrasting with baddm.
bar, lit. bright (cf. Song 6.10), is now well illustrated from deeds of
emancipation from the palace of Ras Shamra, which declare as the sun is
clear (br) so shall X be clear. Since Jobs constant complaint is that God
treats him as a condemned sinner, the sense cannot be as MT implies, that Job
declares that he is right in Gods eyes. Hence, as the sequel indicates, the text
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must be emended to read either hy eney (you were in your own
eyes), so Tur-Sinai, Pope, or, in direct speech like v. 4a, hy enay (I
have been in my own eyes), so Siegfried, Duhm, or hy enwy (I have
been in his eyes), so Merx, Hlscher, Fohrer after LXX.
5. Though MT dabbr might be admitted as the inn. constr., or verbal noun,
as direct object of yittn, yedabbr should be read on the analogy of 6.8 and
14.13. The meter would demand perhaps the omission of elah or welm.
6. MT k-ilayim leiyyh was read by LXX and V and defended by Dhorme,
who renders the colon, which he takes as parenthetical, For they are ambiguous to be understood. kilayim means double in Isa. 40.2, but this is
quantitative, and the sense of ambiguous is not attested. tiyyh is parallel
to wisdom (omh) and counsel (eh) in Wisdom literature, and is so
understood by Hlscher. But omh and eh also denote respectively the
foresight which envisages the implications and end of an action and the
effective realization of ones plan; hence Fohrer renders tiyyh (Erfolg and
our effect have the same implications). For MT kilayim Merx, Bickell,
Hlscher, Horst and Fohrer suggest kielm (as wonders); cf. Budde, G.B.
Gray, Buttenwieser and Stevenson, who omit k as a dittograph after k, which
we accept. We should press the signicance of pelm as manifestation of
Gods immediate activity to the realization of His purposes, discarding the
complexity of secondary causes which enable humans to understand His
activity. It is thus that Gods wonders are secrets (taalum), and require the
special revelation and explanation, which this verse promises.
What is stressed is that humans should not prejudge any case; it is the nal
effect (tiyyh) that is really signicant in Gods immediate activity (pelm).
The imperative da emphasizes the certainty of the following statement (GKC,
110i). MT of v. 6c, And know that God will make you forget part of your
sins, is not in accord with the context, which emphasizes the automatic
connection between sin and retribution and Gods inexorable justice by the
most censorious of Jobs friends. Hence the following emendations should
be seriously considered: yeawweh le aawne (adjusts [your punishment] to your fault), so Budde, Bickell and Loisy after LXX, or yiale
mawne (will question you about your sin), so Ehrlich, Dhorme, Sutcliffe
(1949: 67), for which Dhorme cites Arab. aala an (to question about, lit.
to question from).
7. Lvque has well observed (p. 622) that qer, signicantly occurring ve
times in the rest of the OT and seven times in Job, is a word of exceptional
theological intensity, denoting not only search (Job 8.8), investigation (Job
5.9; 9.10), enquiry (Job 34.24) but also the inaccessible object of search (Isa.
40.28; Ps. 141.3), e.g. the bottom of the abyss (Job 38.16), the secrets of a
kings heart (Prov. 25.3) and the ultimate motive of the Creator (Job 11.7).
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210
The usage of the word in Isa. 40.28, Ps. 145.3 and Prov. 25.3 indicates the
salutary sense of limitations acknowledged by Hebrew wisdom despite its
earnest belief that the fullment of life depended upon the recognition of a
Divine Order in nature and society of which it was possible to discern
evidences and to which it was possible to adapt oneself.
m might mean, as usually, nd, but as in Josh. 2.22, 1 Kgs 14.14, etc.,
it may also mean to reach in the sense of overtake or arrive at, as the
Aram. cognate me (Dan. 7.13). The fondness of the author of Job for wordplay indicates that in v. 7a it means nd and in v. 7b reach as the locative
preposition ad indicates; cf. Arab. maa(y), to pass right on, hence to
penetrate to.
tal from klh (to be complete), may mean perfection (e.g. Ps.
139.22) or limit, as in 26.10; 28.3, where the verb qar governs tal.
8. For MT goeh mayim LXX the heavens are high indicates a reading
gehm mayim, which may be a corruption of gehh miamayim through
the corruption of h to y in the Old Heb. script and the wrong division of
consonants. This reading is supported by the comparison in the parallel colon.
9. middh should possibly be read for MT middh.
10. In this verse MT im-yaal weyasgr weyaqhl m yeenn recalls
9.11b-12a, weyaal wel-n l hn yat m yeienn, and has been
taken as a gloss after this passage (so Bickell, Beer, Duhm, Hlscher). We
suggest that it is indeed an echo, but mindful of the fondness of the author for
word-plays, we consider that he exploits certain homonyms, la as a
synonym of ar, as in 9.11, and la as the cognate of Arab. alafa, the
VIII form of which means to seize from behind, i.e. to arrest. In yaqhl the
verb may be cognate with a Syr. root from which qahlanay (litigious) is
derived, and so may mean arraign. Guillaume cites Arab. qahala (to
administer a severe reprimand).
In yeenn the Hiphil of (to return) understands the object word,
but as this is tantamount to the transitive verb to answer it takes a personal
direct object.
11. If MT wel yibnn is accepted it has been suggested that the sense is
that God knows the evil of humans immediately without having to consider
the evidence narrowly (so G.B. Gray). Alternatively for the negative l, l is
suggested (cf. S), which omits the negative (so Reuss, Duhm, Dhorme,
Hlscher, Kissane). Hlscher objects that hibnn (reexive) never takes le
before the object, but this objection is invalid if l is taken as an ethic dative,
which seems to be implied in S. On the other hand the reference to an inane
man ( n) in v. 12a suggests a word-play with yibnn so that l
yibnn may mean one does not consider it, or, if the subject is me-w in
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211
v. 11a, nal w of an original yibnen may be omitted by haplography before

the initial w of the next word (so substantially Lindblom, Hertzberg, Szcygiel
and Horst), they do not consider it. Alternatively the meaning may be that
God sees evil but permits no scrutiny of himself.
12. In n yill Guillaume (1963: 111) has correctly noticed a
word-play on l, meaning heart and intelligence in Heb. (cf. Arab. albb
and lubbu[n], pith), while n has an Arab. cognate unbb, a hollow
tube; cf. inbb used in the Baal myth of Ras Shamra of the shaft communicating between the earth and the remote home of the gods in Gordon UT nt
IV.178 and nt pl. ix.II.4.
The phrase pere m must be taken as a compound phrase. Dhorme
suggests that m pere signies that the subject has all the attributes of the
species, and translates a proper onager. Unfortunately he cannot cite evidence for this use of m. A more likely explanation is that of Dahood
(1963a: 124f.) that m here and in pere m (the desert-dwelling
Ishmael) in Gen. 16.12 means steppe; cf. the better known Arab. admu(n),
which has this meaning, and cf. 36.28 yira al m r (perhaps r,
They drip as showers on the steppe).
MT yiwwl is explained by Dhorme as becomes, assumes the nature of,
citing Prov. 17.17, beol- h hra we lerh (perhaps ler)
yiwwl, which he understands as A friend loves in every emergency but a
brother becomes a rival (cf. rh, a rival wife in 1 Sam. 1.6, Arab.
arratu(n), but the meaning may rather be a brother is a born rival (NEB).
Fohrer reads yillm for MT yiwwl, rendering and an onager stallion be
trained.
Though ayir is masc., certainly in Gen. 32.16, there is no positive evidence
that it meant specically stallion, though that is likely. It denotes a mature
riding animal, cf. Judg. 10.4; 12.14; Zech. 9.9 and the Ras Shamra texts
Gordon UT 51.IV.4, 9, 1 Aqht 52, 57. The point is that the word signies a
domestic animal in contrast to the wild ass of the steppe. The original text of
v. 12b may have read keayir pere m yillm, assuming corruption of k
to w in the Old Heb. script.
13. For MT han LXX reads haz (you puried). Dhorme retains MT,
citing hn l in Ps. 78.8 and Ass. kn libb, faithfulness of heart. The
parallel in Ps. 78.8 suggests stability, hence our translation settle your
mind.
The spreading out of the hands (kappm, lit. palms) denotes the conventional attitude of prayer in ancient Israel (Exod. 9.29, 33; 1 Kgs 8.22, 38).
15. The raising of the head signies condence as well as deance (see above
on 10.15) and also acquittal.
min in mimmm is privative, thus stainless.
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212
msq, lit. molten, e.g. of metal smelted from ore (28.2) and also set
(37.18), hence here rmly established.
16. atth should probably be read for MT atth. See textual note (so Reiske,
Merx, Siegfried, Hlscher, Weiser, Fohrer after S).
17. The parallel colon suggests that the initial m in miohorayim is scribal
corruption of k in the Heb. script.
MT le (pausal) has been thought to demand the pronominal sufx, so
elde is proposed (Duhm, Budde, G.B. Gray, Beer, Kissane after T). The
parallelism supports Ehrlichs proposal that le (darkness) is to be read; cf.
Arab. alika (to be very black).
MT tuh, a verbal form from the root or (to be dark), is rather to
be pointed teuh, a verbal noun with preformative t (so S and T).
The usage of qm meaning to become is paralleled in Arab. qma yqm
(to stand in place of).
18. For Ehrlichs reading weuppart for MT weart (so also Dhorme,
Hlscher, Steinmann), cf. Arab. afara (to protect). See textual note.
19. weill pney (lit. and they will sweeten your face) is borrowed from
religious usage, where it may have originally denoted the anointing of some
symbol of the divine presence (pnm).
20. mappa-nee means lit. the breathing out (root na) of the breath, i.e.
expiring.
Job 1214
JOBS STATEMENT
The rst part of Jobs statement (12.213.12), which is directed against his
friends, consists of six strophes in the literary convention and idiom of
sapiential controversy (12.2-3, 4-6; 13.1-3, 4-6, 7-9, 10-12). Into this direct
argument of Job the passage 12.7-25 is inserted, probably the citation of a
Wisdom poem1 on the subject of natural knowledge of Gods sovereignty in
nature and history, where the cumulative activities of God are introduced by
participles in vv. 17ff., a feature of the Hymn of Praise. The sapiential poet has
adapted the Hymn, the subject being introduced in 12.7-8, 11-12, which,
following Dhormes arrangement, we take as the rst strophe of the Wisdom
psalm. In the context of the Book of Job the passage 12.7-25 serves to indicate
Jobs familiarity with the orthodox faith and morality which he criticizes. It
has been suggested that it was a later interpolation (so Siegfried, Tur-Sinai,
Gordis, Fohrer). But, whatever its origin, the emphasis on the negative aspect
of the omnipotence of God reects the mood of Job throughout the Dialogue
and seems to us a strong argument for the adaptation of the poem, if not
indeed the actual composition, by the author of the Book.
In the second part of his address (13.13-27) Job prepares to address his case
directly to God (vv. 13-19), which he does in vv. 20-28. The gure and the
dialectic of the contention at law characterizes this section, which may be
divided into ve strophes (vv. 13-15, 16-19, 20-22, 23-25, 26-27 + 14.5c).
In the third part (ch. 14) in eight strophes (14.1-2 + 13.28 + 14.3; 14.4-6, 79, 10-12, 13-14, 15-17, 18-19 + 14a, 20-22) Job deplores the brevity and
misery of human life (14.1-2; 13.28) which he contrasts with a tree (14.7-9,
10-12) and in the second half he appeals to God to set a term to his suffering
and eventually admit his appeal, but ends in a statement of despair. Here there
is a mixture of juristic phraseology and gure and the arguments of the
sapiential controversy, with analogies from natural phenomena reminiscent of
Proverbs. In any case it is well adapted to Jobs argument and is a striking
elaboration of his statement in 7.6-10. Chapter 14 ttingly ends the rst part of
1. Fohrer regards this passage as two Wisdom poems separate or in fusion, dividing the
passage 12.7-11 and 12-25. Since both parts concern the sovereignty of God, even if with
Dhorme we were to regard vv. 9-10 as displaced from before v. 13, it is not difcult to
accept the unity of the passage.
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214
Job 1214. Jobs Statement
the Dialogue, anticipating Jobs direct appeal to God for vindication (cf.
16.13-22; 17.3), the statement of his sufferings, elaborated as in the Plaint of
the Sufferer (16.7-17; 17.1-3, 4-16; 30.1-19, 26-31), with his nal appeal in
his great oath of purgation (31.5-32).
There is possibly some displacement of the text in chs. 13 and 14 as well as
in 12.7-12.
Chapter 12
1.
And Job answered and said:
2.
Indeed you are the community,

And with you wisdom will die;
But I also have sense as you,
(I am not inferior to you)1
And who has not his share of the like?
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
11.
12.
9.
10.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
I am one who is a laughing-stock to his neighbour,

As one who appealed to God and he tormented him.2
(The innocent and perfect man is a laughing-stock.)3
We may despise calamity is the thought of him who is at ease;
But4 it is an urgent certainty for him whose foot slips.
The tents of brigands are at ease,
And those who trouble God enjoy security.
(Regarding him who had brought God into his power.)5
But ask the beasts6
And the birds of the sky that they may tell you,
Or the reptiles of the ground7 that they may instruct you,8
Or the sh of the sea that they may tell you.
Does not the ear test words,
And the palate taste food?
Decrepitude is not the repository of wisdom,
Old age is not identical with understanding.
Who among all these does not know
That this is the effect of the power of Yahweh,
In whose hand is the life of all that lives,
And whose gift10 is the spirit of all esh?
With him is wisdom and might;
He has both purpose and insight.
If he destroys nothing can be rebuilt;
If he closes (the door) on a man it may not be opened;
If he restrains the waters they dry up;
And if he lets them go they overwhelm the land.
With him is strength and effective purpose;
To him relate the deluder and the deluded.
He makes delusions of the plans of counselors,11
Makes fools of rulers.
The Book of Job

18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
215
He unfastens the belt12 of kings,

And fastens a loin-cloth on their loins;
He makes priests walk away barefoot,
And overturns established persons.
He deprives spokesmen of speech,
And takes away the discrimination of elders.
He pours contempt on princes,
And loosens the belt of the strong,
Revealing deep things from the darkness,
And bringing forth deepest gloom to light.
He makes peoples great and then destroys13 them;
He spreads peoples14 abroad and abandons them.15
He takes away the sense of the leaders of a people,16
And causes them to wander17 in pathless deserts;
They grope in darkness with no light,
And stagger18 like a drunkard.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
This, which is not in LXX, is probably a gloss from 12.2.

Reading wayeannh for MT wayanh (and he answered him).
This also is wanting in LXX, and is probably a secondary expansion.
Assuming the omission of w after m and before nn in the Old Heb. script.
Probably to be omitted as a gloss.
Omitting MT werekk as a dittograph of werekk in v. 8a.
Reading zal re for MT a lre. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading weyr for MT werekk in agreement with the plur. subject zal
re.
Reading l, emended from l, the last word in v. 11, which must be transposed to
v. 12 metri causa
Reading for MT , assuming corruption of w to y in the stage of the development of the script represented by the Qumran MSS. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading mile yam mell for MT mli yam ll. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading msr for MT msr.
Reading wabbem for MT wayeabbem.
Reading leummm for MT laggyim.
Reading weynm for MT wayyanm.
Omitting MT hre.
Reading weym for MT wayyam.
Reading weyitt for MT wayyam, taking m as dittograph of following k in the
Old Heb. script.
2. In MT omnm k attem-m commentators have suspected the indenite
m and have suggested various emendations, e.g. hm (Duhm, Weiser),
with him, i.e. for him (Loisy), arumm, cunning (Beer), yem,
1
216
knowing ones (Steinmann, Horst), hayyem, the knowing ones (Klostermann, G.B. Gray, Ball, Hlscher, Stevenson) and am-aam, discriminating
people (Reiske, Horst). The ancient versions support m or hm, and the
alliteration amimmem is probably intentional. If m or hm is to be
read (so Dhorme, Tur-Sinai, Fohrer) the sense may be you comprise the tribe,
or community, and its inherited traditions and experience, understanding am
in its Arabic sense. There is thus an emphasis laid on the traditional generalizing doctrine of the community against which Job cites his personal experience.
The passage introduced by omnm is keenly ironic.
In v. 2b Aq. and Sym. translate with you is perfection of wisdom, indicating a reading tumma, or tumm, omh (so Tur-Sinai and J. Reider). This is
feasible and deserves serious consideration.
3. la denotes the heart as the seat of cognition (cf. 11.12), v. 2a probably
alluding to Zophars remark on the lack of sense in the inane man in his
reply to Job in 11.12.
Verse 2b is probably to be omitted as an inadvertent scribal repetition of
13.2b (so Merx, Siegfried, Beer, Duhm, G.B. Gray, Ball, Dhorme, Hlscher,
Stevenson, Fohrer).
For the use of nal (to abase onself), cf. Est. 6.13.
4. Jobs whole complaint is that he appeals to God and is not answered, so MT
wayyaanh (and he answered him) may be pointed either weyaanh, that
he might answer him (so Reiske, Hoffmann, Oort, Hlscher, Stevenson,
Horst) or wayyeannh, and he tormented him. We would see a probable
word-play between the expected answer (nh) and the actual response,
torment (innh). Fohrer retains MT.
5. lapp bz (for calamity contempt) is probably a citation of the attitude, or
thought (at) of him who is at ease (aann). le before at is explicable
as the emphatic enclitic found before predicates in Arab. and Ugaritic.
nn, the Niphal participle of kn, means certain in Deut. 13.15; cf.
xed and prepared (Prov. 19.29; 2 Chron. 8.16). The verb ma (to slip,
totter) is attested only in Heb. poetry, e.g. 2 Sam. 22.37 // Pss. 18.37; 26.1;
37.31.
6. In MT as it stands v. 6c has a general reference to v. 6ab but the sing. verb
and pronominal sufx in v. 6c indicates a different subject. Hlscher takes
v. 6c as the second colon of a decient bicolon Woe to himwhom God has
brought into his hand. Bickell, Siegfried, Beer, Ball, Fohrer regard it as a
gloss on v. 6ab, meaning regarding him who has brought God into his power
either by magic (so Fohrer) or, as we prefer, having enlisted God secondarily
to his material power, in agreement with Hab. 1.11: z llh (whose
own strength is his god).
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The Book of Job
217
8. For MT a lre (shrubs of the earth), where le is questionable. zal

ere is proposed (Duhm, Beer, Dhorme, Stevenson, G.B. Gray, Mowinckel,
Terrien), which is graphically more feasible than ayya hre (BH3,
adopted by Fohrer) or ela lre, send to the earth (Horst; cf. Popes
reading of MT speak to the earth). In the context of the reference to beasts,
birds and sh reptiles (zal ere) is most natural.
11-12. This passage, probably displaced in MT, concludes the sapiential
introduction to the passage on the natural knowledge of the Sovereignty of
God. The introductory strophe vv. 7-8, 11-12 emphasizes the signicance of
natural knowledge; each person has the ability to assess, reason and discriminate (v. 11), and this is not the monopoly of age (v. 12). On the transposition
of l from the end of v. 11 to the beginning of v. 12 and the emendation to l,
see textual note. Alternatively Dhorme retains l in v. 11 as an ethic dative and
assumes the omission of hal at the beginning of v. 12 by haplography after
hal at the beginning of v. 11. But this contradicts the sense of the strophe.
12. y (old man) is well attested (2 Chron. 35.17; Ben Sira 8.6; and
particularly Job 15.10; 29.8; 32.6). Here it has the nuance of its Arab. cognate
wawaa (to be decrepit). The allusion is to Bildads emphasis on the wisdom
of the fathers (8.8).
9f. This passage is more apt as the introduction to the sapiential adaptation of
the Hymn of Praise in vv. 13-25 in supplying in Yahweh the required
antecedent to the pronominal sufx in imm in v. 13.
9. The signicance of z is problematic. It has been referred to Zophars
statement of the providence of God, culminating in his statement after his
assurance to Job of rehabilitation after supplication that the eyes of the
wicked shall fail (11.20) or that God is omnipotent. We would refer it to a
single proposition already expressed. This we nd in Jobs animadversion on
the security of the wicked with impunity (v. 6), the survival of the strongest
independent of moral considerations being characteristic of the beasts.
Here exceptionally in the Book of Job the divine name Yahweh is used in
the poetic portion of the Book, and it is to be noted that the more regular term
elah appears here in ve Heb. MSS. The name Yahweh, however, may be
explained on the assumption that the writer has the citation of the Hymn of
Praise (vv. 13-25) in mind, which recalls particularly hymns of praise in
Deutero-Isaiah, and Dhorme has proposed that an original elah was altered
to MT Yahweh by a writer who recognized the afnity of the passage in Job
with Isa. 41.20.
10. In reading for MT and rendering gift we follow Dahood; cf. Arab.
awu(n) (gift), the Nabataean-Aram. name aws al-Baali (Cooke 1903: no.
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218
104, 1.2; cf. 103) and the Heb. name Joash. This restores the chiastic parallelism in the colon, the pronominal sufx in bey doing double duty for the
pronominal sufx wanting in the parallel , as regularly in Ugaritic.
ay may denote living creatures and br specically humankind in the
physical aspect, as in Gen. 6.12, 13; Num. 16.22; 27.16 (all P); Deut. 5.23;
Pss. 45.21; 65.31; Isa. 40.5, 6; 49.26; 66.16, 23, 24; etc., though kol-br also
includes animals in Gen. 6.17, 19; 7.21; 9.11, 15ff.; Lev. 17.14; etc. If kolbr in the present passage denotes specically humankind, ra may denote
the divine afatus which gives humans afnity with God as distinct from
physical animation (nee). See above on 6.4.
13. omh here in conjunction with gerh, means know-how, the phrase
corresponding to brains and brawn in English idiom; h is the rmly conceived purpose as well as the plans for carrying it out (see above on 5.12f.),
and tenh here denotes the divine intelligence and discrimination in the
relation of his plan to the total situation, which is so often impugned by Job.
Note also the association of h and tiyyh in the function of Wisdom in
Prov. 8.14. The element of discrimination is probably dominant in the verbal
root bn from which tenh is derived; cf. bn (between and Arab. bna[y],
to be separated, conspicuous).
14. Here hn means as in Aram. if; cf. Arab. in.
hras is a strong word meaning to bring down in ruins, e.g. pagan altars
(Judg. 6.25; 2 Sam. 11.25; 1 Kgs 18.30; 19.10, 14; 2 Kgs 3.25), strongholds
(Ezek. 26.4; Lam. 2.2), walls (Ezek. 13.14: 28.12), and the house destroyed by
a foolish woman (Prov. 14.1).
15. The same conception of divine constraint (here yar) on the waters in
drought, but with a different verb (rk), occurs in the Ras Shamra legend of
Aqht (Gordon UT 1 Aqht 42). In Gods control of the waters it is to be noted
that it is not His benecence in restraining the oods and sending the necessary rain that is emphasized in v. 15, but his destructive potential in drought
and ood, where the same verb (ha) is used as in the overwhelming of
Sodom and Gomorrah (Amos 4.11).
16. On tiyyh meaning, effective purpose, see above on 5.12.
Duhm proposed to emend MT to h, the more familiar form, which
is actually found in certain Heb. MSS (cf. 6.24; 19.4), but may well be a
byform; cf. Lev. 5.18, Num. 15.28 and Ps. 119.67, which are all late like the
Dialogue in Job.
17. In MT the repetition of ml, the rst word, and ll (pausal), the third
word, in vv. 17 and 19 is suspect, and may be the inadvertency of a copyist.
1
The Book of Job
219
LXXA
reads the counsellors of the earth, which is adopted by Duhm, who

further emends MT ll (barefoot) to ikkl (has made fools of); cf. in a
similar context ikkl in Isa. 44.25, which is supported by Sym. (so also Beer).
Hlscher and Mowinckel also read ikkl, but for ml Hlscher reads mela,
thus mela yam ikkl (he brings to nothing the counsel of counsellors).
Horst also reads mela in its Aram. sense of counsel, but for MT ll
understands plunders, which does not suit the predicate counsel. The verb
ikkl would be an apt parallel to yehll, though graphically not a likely
original of the corrupt ll. Accordingly we adopt Horsts reading mile
yam (the plans of counsellors), but read mell for MT ll from a verb,
admittedly not attested in the OT, but cognate with Arab. la, yal meaning
in the II form to delude, following G.R. Driver (1936: 160).
18. For MT msar (chastisement, correction) the general sense and the
parallelism indicate the reading msr (belt, lit. bond); so V and T.
pa (to open out, here a knot) is the opposite of ar (to put a girdle
on, or, to gird on armour; cf. 1 Sam. 17.39; 1 Kgs 20.11; Isa. 45.1). Dhorme
takes this to mean that God sets kings free (looses their bonds); so too Fohrer,
taking the noun to mean fetters; and so also T possibly thinking of Manasseh
(2 Chron. 33.13) and he binds fetters on them at will (v. 18b); so too
Hlscher. But msr is more likely to be a girdle of honour or uniform of a
warrior and zr in v. 13b a loincloth; cf. Arab. zr (waist-sash). This
sustains the antithetic parallelism and may be supported by Isa. 45.1, moen
melm aatta.
19. It is perhaps signicant that khn (priest) occurs nowhere else in Job,
which may indicate that the passage vv. 17-21 refers specically to the Exile,
when all the dignitaries mentioned were deported. MT ll is found in the OT
only here and in Mic. 1.6 (Qere) associated with rm (naked). It may be
the corruption of the participle meulllm with haplography of m preformative
and afformative respectively after m and before w in the Old Heb. script. The
verb may be cognate with Arab. alla (to draw out, e.g. a sword from the
sheath).
nm is used in the singular in Amos 5.24 of a perennial wadi, and in the
plural of the regular former rains of early winter in Palestine, whence the
name of the month Ethanim. As here it denotes persons rmly established in
Num. 24.21, m n (a rm seat); cf. Arab. watana (to remain long in a
place).
sla in the Piel is used meaning to subvert in Exod. 23.8 and Prov. 23.6.
20. As is demanded by msr (turning away) l here denotes from, as in
Ugaritic; cf. T minneemnm. Dhorme took neemnm to mean sincere, i.e.
trustworthy. The ancient Jewish commentators connected the word with neum
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220
(oracle, prophetic declaration), which the attribute h might support.

In any case it denotes the accredited leaders of society; cf. khn neemn in
1 Sam. 2.35, custodians of the traditions and interests of the community, as
Fohrer suggests, and so, we consider, as indicated by h, its spokesmen.
The parallel elders supports this interpretation.
21. The parallelism and the general sense indicates that aqm cannot have
the usual meaning streams, and this is appreciated by T and S in rendering
strong (teqm), and Beer so emends MT. But an Assyrian root epqu (to be
strong) may be adduced, thus making emendation of MT unnecessary (so
Dillmann, Friedrich Delitzsch, Dhorme, Perles, Hlscher, Stevenson, Horst,
Fohrer); cf. Arab. af qu(n) (excelling in noble qualities).
meza is the same as meza of Ps. 109.18. Dhorme cites Ass. meza, a
synonym of mezirru (belt).
22. This verse is obviously a secondary expansion from some hymn, as maintained by Budde, Dhorme, Steinmann, Fohrer, Pope. amuq, deep things,
with the nuance of wise, as in English, recalls Akk. nemegu (wisdom).
23. a means to spread out, with an Arab. cognate aaa which, like the
Hebrew verb, means either to spread out or extend, like dough rolled out,
or prostrate, for example, of a camel made to couch. So v. 23b could mean
either He spreads people abroad and abandons them, reading weyannm for
MT wayyanm (see textual note) or He prostrates them and brings them into
abeyance (lit. causes them to rest, i.e. abandons them). The ancient versions
and later commentators differ in reading MT mag (makes great or numerous), as V, T, Delitzsch, G.B. Gray, Dhorme, Mowinckel, Hlscher, Horst,
Fohrer, Pope, Terrien, and magh (misleads), as Theod., LXX, S and certain
Heb. MSS, Merx, Graetz, Siegfried, Tur-Sinai, Stevenson. The problem is not
conclusively solved by the complementary verb wabbem (see textual note),
which means either He causes them to perish, which would support MT, or
He causes them to be lost (cf. 1 Sam. 9.3, 20), which would support mah.
The parallel colon, reading weyannm, indicates the meaning destroys.
24. In v. 24a LXX omits am from MT r am-hre, which Jerome
questioned. In v. 24b wayyam beh l-re (and he caused them to go
astray in a pathless desert) corresponds verbally to Ps. 107.40b, by which it
may be directly inuenced. In l-re and in l-r in v. 25a the compound
phrase is tantamount to a negative adjective.
25. ma (to grope) in the Piel is attested in 5.14. The direct accusative
darkness is noteworthy, indicating the nuance of feeling or touching as
in the Arab. cognate, cf. Exod. 10.21 (darkness that can be felt), alluding
perhaps to the dullness of the dust-laden sirocco.
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The Book of Job
221
For MT wayyam LXX, followed by Bickell, Beer, Duhm, G.B. Gray,

Dhorme, Peters, Hlscher, Horst, reads wayyitt (and they staggered),
which is supported by Isa. 19.14; 28.7, here also associated with kaikkr
(like a drunkard).
Chapter 13
Jobs Argument (continued)
Verse 28 is obviously incongruous with its context in ch. 13, and is displaced
from after 14.2, and 14.5c is probably displaced from after v. 27c.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
Lo, my eye has seen all these things,1

My ear has heard and understood.
I know as well as you,
I am not inferior to you.
But I would speak to the Almighty,
Yea, I am determined to argue my case with God.
But you2 plaster up a faade of delusion,
Quack doctors all of you.
Would that you would keep silent;
It would pass for wisdom with you.
Hear now the argument of my mouth,3
And pay attention to the contention4 of my lips.
Will you speak what is wrong on Gods behalf,
And chant5 deceit for his sake?
Will you patronize the Almighty?6
Will you plead for God?
Would it be well if He were to examine you?
Do you trie with him as you would trie7 with a human?
He will remonstrate severely with you
If dishonestly you show partiality to him.8
Will not his majesty appal you,
All his terror fall upon you?
Your maxims are ashes raked out,
Your answers9 are silted-up cisterns.10
Be silent before me that I may speak,
Come upon me what may.
11
I shall take my own esh in my teeth,
And shall lay my life in my hand.
If he kill me, I am (in any case) without hope;
I will defend my conduct in argument to his face.
Yea, this12 might be my salvation,
That no hypocrite might face Him.
222
13Now
17.
hear out what I have to say,

Yea, what I have to declare in your ears.
See, I set out my case,
I am sure that I am innocent.
Who could sustain his contention against me?
(If any could) I should hold my peace and (be content to) die.
18.
19.
20.
Only do two things for me,

Then will I not hide myself from your face;
Remove your hand from upon me,
And let not terror of you overwhelm me;
Then call and I will answer,
Or let me make a statement, and do you answer.
21.
22.
23.
How many are my iniquities and faults?

Inform me of my transgressions and sin.
Why do you hide your face,
And consider me as your enemy?
Will you harry a driven leaf?
Yea, will you14 chase dry chaff?
24.
25.
26.
Nay, but you debit me with things past

And entail upon me the iniquities of my youth;
And set my feet in the stocks,
And keep watch on all my paths.
You limit my roots,15
You have set their bounds16 that they may not pass.17
27.
14.5c.

1.
Reading with a certain minuscule of LXX, S, V and certain Heb. MSS. kol-lleh for
kl.
Omitting welm metri causa as a dittograph of lm in v. 3.
Reading taa p with LXX, as the parallel ria eay demands.
Reading ra with LXX, S, V and T for MT r.
Reading teadd for MT teabber. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading pen adday.
Reading hattl in both instances.
Reading pnyw for MT pnm with Sym., S, T and V.
Reading gem for MT gabbem. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading gubb for gabb. See Commentary ad loc.
Omitting MT al-mh as a marginal correction of lay mh at the end of v. 13,
which has crept into the text at the beginning of 14.
Reading h with LXX for MT h.
This verse is probably a secondary interpolation. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading weim (interrogative) for MT wee.
Omitting ralay, inserted after the displacement of 14.5c. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading uqqm for MT uqq (Qere),
Reading yaar for MT yaar.
MT
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
The Book of Job
223
1. Seeing and hearing refer to personal experience, which may both substantiate or modify accepted doctrine, supplemented by understanding implying discrimination of what one hears. On the reading kol-lleh for MT kl see
textual note. This may refer to the friends statement of current doctrine or, we
prefer, the theme of the Hymn of Praise just cited (12.13-25).
3. On ha, here to argue, see above on 9.33.
The verb a, usually meaning to take pleasure, be willing, has here
rather the nuance of the Syr. cognate to be eager, zealous, hence our
rendering I am determined.
4. el qer, lit. plasterers of falsehood, recalls the same verb and object
in Ps. 119.69a, and is compared by Dhorme to the Ass. expression taqirtu
apiltu (a false imputation, or smear); cf. Arab. ala (to be soiled by
dirt). This is the sense of Ps. 119.69a, but in the present passage the parallel
re elil (quack doctors) indicates not deliberate malice, but patching up
or disguising unpalatable truth, as we should say, whitewashing, covering
defects of building by plaster. Jobs interlocutors are blinking awkward truths
by reiterating orthodox statements uncritically. This interpretation is borne out
by Jobs imputation of partiality to God (vv. 8, 10), their acquiescence in
justice in the theodicy (v. 7), and, in fact, their triing with God (v. 10).
6. taa, as the parallel ra epay, contention of my mouth (see textual
note) indicates argument. See on 9.33.
7. In v. 7b LXX varies the verb to declare (MT teabber), rendering
phthengesthe (you speak out loud and clear). As an emendation with the
minimal disturbance of MT we may suggest teadd with its double meaning
of talk wildly, babble, or sing out; cf. bdd in the Ras Shamra text, Gordon
UT nt I.19, where ybd is parallel to yr (he sang). Though the double
entendre of the verb cannot be so neatly expressed in English, a not unapt
translation might be chant, which might be supported by LXX.
halel in v. 7a is by position emphatic, with emphasis on God.
8. The metre demands an extra beat in v. 8a, which suggests that for MT
hanyw we should read haen adday.
9. In v. 9b the Piel of hal (to trie with) should be read in both instances,
as in 1 Kgs 18.24.
10. ha has the sense both of to argue and chastise (see on 9.33), which
we may express by remonstrate severely.
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224
basser (lit. in secret) means here dishonestly, i.e. willfully glossing

over unpleasant truths and entrenching oneself in a false position, disguising
conviction under the faade of orthodox declarations.
n nm (read nyw, see textual note), lit. lift the face, is a familiar
phrase in the OT meaning to pardon, hence to show partiality, of which
prospon lambanein in the LXX and the NT is a literal rendering, meaning to
show partiality. The phrase refers originally to the gesture of a potentate
stretching forth his sceptre and raising the face of the prostrate suppliant, e.g.
Est. 8.33ff.
11. e (his elevation, so his majesty), the innitive construct, or verbal
noun of ns with the pronominal sufx, is deliberate word-play on the verb
after n nyw in v. 10b.
On ba (to come suddenly upon, so to overwhelm) see above on 3.5;
cf. 2 Sam. 22.5 = Ps. 18.5, where the physical sense of the verb is indicated by
the parallel an (whirled me, caught me up in their maelstrom); cf.
Arab. baata (to fall suddenly upon). The verb, whether in this sense or
meaning to terrify, is more common in Job than elsewhere in the OT, e.g.
3.5; 7.14; 9.34; 13.11, 21; 15.24; 18.11; 33.7. Here the parallel colon indicates
the meaning is appal.
12. zirnem means your memorabilia, here either sayings worthy of
record, i.e. maxims, or, as Rowley suggests, your memorized sayings, which
you repeat parrot-like.
In miel er we would see a double entendre (proverb of ashes and
ashes raked out, lit. extractions of ashes), from a verb lh, admittedly not
certainly attested in the OT, but a possible cognate of Syr. el with this
sense. The gure would then be of dead embers extracted from the baking
oven after their heat was gone, no unapt gure for the spent force of the arguments of orthodoxy which had outlived their usefulness and were irrelevant to
Jobs actual experience.
In v. 12b gabb (lit. backs, or bosses for shields, cf. 15.26), is taken as
synecdoche for shields, which, of clay, would be useless (so Duhm, Budde,
G.B. Gray, Fohrer). The view which was rst propounded by Beer is that
gem should be read for MT gabbem, the word being cognate with Syr.
and Arab. jbatu(n), plur. jawb answers (so Dhorme, Hlscher, Mowinckel,
Larcher [JB], Horst, Lvque). Seeing a word-play, we take MT gabb-mer
as gubb-mer (silted-up cisterns, lit. wells of mud); cf. Aram. gubb and
Arab. jubbu(n) (a well).
The enclitic le introducing the predicate of a nominal sentence, as in
Ugaritic and Arab, may be noted.
13. The indenite mh (whatsoever) with the ellipse of a second verb, in the
sense here of come upon me whatsoever may, is paralleled in 2 Sam. 18.22f.
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14. LXX omits al-mh, which is probably a dittograph of the last two words
lay mh in v. 13. Dahoods proposal to retain it as lmh (for ever)
(1965b: 16) is to be rejected. Horst and Fohrer propose more feasibly that almh should be taken with v. 13, reading mh al-mh.
The meaning of the gure of taking ones esh in ones teeth, not elsewhere
attested in the OT, is clear from the parallel taking ones life in ones hand
(lit. setting ones life in the palm of ones hand), which has passed into
English idiom; cf. Judg. 12.3; 1 Sam. 19.5; 28.21; Ps. 119.109). For the
expression taking ones life in ones teeth Buttenwieser has adduced an
Arab. parallel from Hudheil an-nafu minhu biidkihi (his life is in his jaws),
meaning he is in deadly jeopardy. The general conception of the couplet is
that confrontation with God endangers ones life (cf. Exod. 3.6; 33.20; Judg.
6.22; 13.22; Isa. 6.5). The signicance of taking ones esh in ones teeth may
indicate that the subject is prepared for the ultimate emergency, as in the
rigours of a siege, when people might resort to cannibalism (Deut. 28.56ff.; 2
Kgs 6.28ff.; Lam. 2.20; Ezek. 5.10; etc.; Josephus, War 4.3-4).
15. For MT l in v. 15a l is read by the Masoretes (Qere), LXX, Aq., S, T and
V, which is the basis of the familiar, though inaccurate, Though he slay me
yet will I trust him (AV). But MT may be retained, meaning (in any case) I am
without hope; cf. Graetzs proposal I shall not be afraid (l l); cf. l
(lit. writhe, sometimes in anguish) // yr in Jer. 5.22 (so Ehrlich, Dhorme).
Formally yal is ambiguous, meaning to wait (Gen. 8.12; 1 Sam. 13.8; etc.)
or to hope (6.11; 29.21, 23; Ps. 71.14; etc.), which seems to us best to suit
the context. The verb qal is rare, poetic and late in Heb., occurring only here,
in 24.14 and Ps. 138.19, but it is regular in Aram. The regular verb to kill in
Arab. is qatala, where the dialectal variant in the second radical is to be noted.
Since the recognition of the signicance of the root drk in Ugaritic and Heb.
as rule, ordered regimen (see on 24.4), deray here and in other passages
relating to conduct or way of life may be derived not from dere (road) but
from a homonym cognate with Ugaritic drkt and Arab. darakatu(n).
16. yeh is not to be confused with tiyyh (success), but means
deliverance, relief, from a root cognate with Arab. waia (to be wide).
Here the sense is rather hope of deliverance. We take n here as in Aram.
and Late Heb. to mean hypocrite, Jobs animadversion or the dishonest
partiality of his friends to God (v. 10b).
17. millh (word) is Aram. and is a regular element in Job.
aaw (my explanation; cf. 15.17) recalls aawya an (explanation of riddles) in Dan. 5.12, where it is denitely Aram. The verbal root
occurs in the OT only at Job 15.17; 32.6, 10, 17; 36.2 and at Ps. 19.3 and
regularly in the Aram. parts of Daniel.
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18. The language is forensic. ra means to set out, arrange, e.g. a table (Ps.
23.5), a battle-line (Judg. 20.22, 1 Sam. 17.8; etc.) or, as here, a case.
19. The rhetorical question in v. 19a suggests If any could as the protasis of a
conditional sentence of which v. 19b is the apodosis.
20. al taken as a negative particle contradicts the sense of the passage. It must
be recognized as a positive particle also, as in Ugaritic, cf. Gordon UT
51.VIII.1, al ttn pnm (set your face, sc. direct yourself).
22. In han, the Hiphil (to return), word is understood, so that it is
tantamount to answer, and so takes a direct object.
25. ra is cognate with Arab. araa (to be restless, of a beast).
e could possibly be (GKC, 117c) the nota accusativa before an indeterminative noun, where something particular is envisaged, but e is not used
even with denite objects in Job, so the emendation of e to im must be
made.
qa is used regularly for light brushwood or chaff, meaning that which is
scaled off, and is gurative of that which is at the mercy of the wind or is of
light account (cf. 41.20ff.).
26. ka indicates either a recorded decision or charge or is a gure from
commerce, as so often in the Quran. ka al means to debit, as in an
administrative text from the palace of Ras Shamra (PRU II, p. 212), (m) m
ksp l gd (50 pieces of silver debited to God), cited by Dahood (1965: 60).
The parallel with the iniquities of my youth (awn nery) supports
Guillaumes suggestion that merrt, generally taken as bitter things, means
rather things past; cf. Arab. marra (to pass by).
27. sa here and at 33.11, which closely re-echoes the present passage, is for
the connement of the feet; cf. Acts 16.24, where S translates se, indicating
a block of wood for this purpose. The connement of the hands in wooden
blocks is known an ancient Egypt (cf. ANET, pl. 326). Noting that the sequel
envisages Job at liberty, ibn Ezra took sa as a corruption of s (chalk,
gypsum), taking the meaning to be the marking of the feet with chalk to have
traces of where the subject had been. Fohrer follows this interpretation, taking
MT wem to mean and you marked from a root mam, which he would
recognize in Jezebels painting her eyes with kul (2 Kgs 9.30). No such root
is attested elsewhere in the OT, but a cognate might be Syr. samsam (to treat
medically). Taking sa to mean stocks or the like, it has been suggested that
the reference to close observance of Jobs straying feet in v. 27bc indicates
that sa was not an immobile block but an encumbrance to the free movement
of the feet, as the wooden blocks on the teams of men in the Egyptian
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227
sculpture already mentioned. Alternatively v. 27a may envisage a slave

detained in an immobile block while v. 27bc might refer to him released for
work when he is under observation.
In v. 27c al-ore raelay tiaqqeh has been taken variously. qh, a
byform of the more regular qaq (to inscribe), is taken by Dhorme to mean
engraving on the mind, which is not attested in the OT and is therefore
doubtful. ore, meaning roots and taken by Dhorme to mean where a man
plants his feet, is also doubtful. Alternatively tiaqqeh is taken to signify
prescribe bounds, which is well attested, but ore raelay (the soles of my
feet) is very doubtful. Just at this point there is some disturbance of text,
13.28 being displaced from its original position after 14.2 (see below ad loc.).
Tricola in the predominant arrangement of bicola in Job, while often intentional, must always be considered on their merits and are occasionally
indications of disturbed text. Accordingly Duhm attached v. 27c to one of the
cola in the next tricolon, viz. 14.5c, restoring:
13.27c
14.5c
al-oreay tiaqqeh
uqqm i l yaar
You have imposed limits on (or made incisions) on my roots,
You have set their bounds that they may not surpass.
The gure is thus that of root-pruning, raelay being added after oreay after
the displacement according to the general sense of v. 27ab.
Chapter 14
This continues Jobs direct address to God in 13.20-27, perhaps combined
with a wisdom poem on the evanescence of humans (vv. 1f., 7-12, 15-22) in
contrast to the revival of a tree when pruned or severely cut back (vv. 1f., 710) and like land-slides, water-worn stones and soil-erosion (vv. 18f.). The
theme is the brief life of humans, full of trouble, his hard service (v. 14bc, cf.
7.1f.) and his ultimate death with no further prospect (vv. 1, 18-22, cf. 7.9bf.).
The mortality of man entitles the sufferer to hope that God would condone
mans limitations and grant him some relief (vv. 5f.). Here v. 14a, if a man
die shall he live again?, is not a gleam of hope of the survival of death, of
Sheol as a temporary refuge (v. 13a). Like Sheol in v. 13a, it is probably a
secondary insertion, but, whatever the belief of the late scribe who may have
been responsible, in its context it has all the appearance of a rhetorical
question which invites a negation, of which the chapter leaves us in no doubt.
Chapter 14
Jobs Argument (Continued)
1.
1
Man born of woman

Is brief of days with ll of trouble.
228
2.
13.28.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
14a.
Like a ower he comes forth and wilts,

Fleeing and unstable as a shadow.
He wears out as a water-skin,1
Like a moth-eaten garment.
Is it then on such as this that you open your eyes,
Bringing him2 into judgment with you?
3(Who
can separate the clean from the unclean? None can.)

Since his days are determined,
And you control the number of his months,
4(His bounds you have set which he may not overstep),
Look away from him and forbear5
Until he discharges as a hireling his term.
For a tree has still hope
Though cut down; it may yet renew itself,
And its young shoots not cease.
Though its roots grow old in the ground,
And its stump is dying in the dust.
At the scent of water it will sprout,
And will develop shoots like a sapling,
But man dies and departs,6
Yea, mankind perishes and where is he?
Water from the sea may be exhausted,
And the river may be dried up and drained.
But man once he has lain down shall never arise,
Until the heavens wear out7 he shall not awake,8
Nor be roused9 from his sleep.10
Would that you would hide me (in Sheol),11
Conceal me till your anger abated,
Set a limit and remember me.
[]12
All the days of my service would I hold out
Until my relief should come.
You would call and I should answer you;
You would care for the work of your hands.
But as it is you number my steps,
You keep watch13 over my transgression;14
My sin is sealed up in a bundle,
And you put sealing clay on my iniquity.
A mountain falls in ruin,15
And a rock shifts from its place;
Water reduces stone to dust;
The ood16 sweeps away the soil of the earth.
And you destroy the hope of man;
If a man die shall he live?
The Book of Job

20.
21.
22.
229
You overpower him utterly and he passes away,

You change his appearance and send him away.
His sons attain honour, but he never knows;
They are reduced, but he does not perceive it.
But on his own account is his body pained,
And on his own account his life-breath laments.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
Reading rqe with LXX for MT rq.

Reading we with LXX, S and V for MT we.
This passage, which is omitted in one Heb. MS, is probably a secondary
interpolation.
Taking v. 5c (emended) as the second colon parallel to 13.27c (see above).
Reading waaal with one Heb. MS for MT weyedl (pausal form).
Reading weyahal after LXX for MT wayyeel (pausal form). See Commentary ad
loc.
Reading bel with Aq., Theod., Sym. and V for MT bilt.
Reading yq for MT yq with LXXA and V.
Reading yr with LXXA and V for MT yr.
Reading mien with LXXA and V for MT mienm.
Probably a gloss as the metre indicates.
Omitting v. 14a as a gloss and displaced from after v. 19c (so Dhorme) or after v.
10 (so Fohrer).
Reading leimr (with le enclitic) for MT l-imr. See Commentary ad loc.
The parallelism with eay (my footsteps) suggests MT a might be a wordplay with Arab. uwatu(n), plur. un (footstep).
Reading nl yippl with Theod. and S for MT nl yibbl.
The verb ti demands the sing. subject, either seh or seh, the latter of
which, suggested by Budde, we prefer on the evidence of Prov. 28.3. See
Commentary.
1. On rez (agitation, trouble), here in the passive sense, see above on 3.17.
The phrase ea-rez (with his ll of trouble) is probably a conscious
parody of the description of a happy life achieved as ea ymm (full of
days, in 42.17; Gen. 25.8).
2. On the gure of humans as ephemeral as a ower (); cf. Isa. 40.6-8; Ps.
103.15; and as a shadow; cf. 8.9; Pss. 102.12 (EVV 11); 109.23; 144.4.
y (to come forth) naturally expresses the emergence of owers or
vegetation (ee; cf. Gen. 1.12; 1 Kgs 5.1; etc.), and requires no emendation; cf. Beers suggestion yima (sprouts).
mlal may mean wilt (so Hlscher, Weiser, Gordis); cf. 18.16 and
probably also 24.24 and Ps. 37.2, where it is parallel to nal (to wither), and
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230
Ps. 90.6. Alternatively it is suggested that it is a byform of ml (to be cut,

circumcised), as in Gen. 17.10; Josh. 5.2 (so G.B. Gray, Fohrer, Pope).
bra means to ee in Hebrew but this is a secondary meaning. The
primary meaning is rather to shift from one position to another; cf. the bolt
(bra), and Arab. al-bri (yesterday), and so also in Ugaritic of the
primaeval serpent (bn br) of Chaos with its Hebrew counterpart n
bra (26.13; Isa. 27.l).
13.28. After 13.27 in the rst person sing. the pronoun h has been an embarrassment to commentators in its position in MT. Displacement is therefore
suggested, after 14.1 according to Stevenson and Peters; after 14.2 according
to Siegfried, Dhorme, Steinmann and Pope; or after 14.5 according to Bickell,
Beer, Wright and Lvque. The gure of wearing out as a wine-skin (rqe,
MT rq) or moth-eaten garment certainly demands ephemeral humanity as
its antecedent and so must be transposed (pace Fohrer) to ch. 14, probably
after the gures of the ower or shadow in 14.2. rqe for rq (rottenness)
is suggested by LXX and S and is to be preferred as the concrete gure, like its
parallel, the moth-eaten garment (bee al ).
3. On the reading for MT see textual note.
4. The meaning of m yittn here is literal, Who can produce? or perhaps
separate?, and does not, as often, introduce a wish. The defective metre
indicates a gloss (so Bickell, Beer, Dhorme, G.B. Gray, Hlscher, Horst). The
preposition min does not necessarily denote derivation here, implying, as
Rowley suggests, the ritual impurity of childbirth (cf. man born of woman)
or the doctrine of original sin. The statement may rather indicate the impossibility of separating the clean from the unclean, humans being the victim of
their environment rather than hereditary sinners. But the subject of the context,
the natural limitations of humans, suggests that they are therefore excusable as
the victims of their heredity. Dhorme, who retains the verse as original (so also
Fohrer), explains the short colon v. 4b as deliberate for the sake of emphasis.
The verse, however, may well be a theological gloss suggested by the conception of man born of woman (yel ih) in v. 1, who was rst tempted and
brought about the fall of humankind and who in childbirth is subject to ritual
impurity.
5. arm, means literally cut sharp, e.g. the sharp-edged studs of the
threshing sledge in Amos 1.3. Here it means dened or decreed; cf. 1 Kgs
20.40; Isa. 10.22.
On v. 5c, displaced here from after 13.27c, see on 13.27.
6. On the reading waaal see textual note. h (to look) in the sense of
look away from is paralleled in 7.19. rh, meaning regularly in Classical
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231
Hebrew to be pleased, means here to discharge an obligation; cf. the

keeping of the Sabbath in Lev. 26.34, 41, 43 (P). Conned to late passages in
the OT, it is regularly used in this sense in Aramaic.
In Jobs unremitted suffering it could hardly be said that he could enjoy his
day (RSV) any more than a hard-worked hireling. The reference is rather to
discharging his term and what is involved to the satisfaction of the one who
imposed it; cf. Isa. 40.2 (nirh awnh). On r (mercenary, hired
worker) see on 7.1f.
7. This is obviously not a regular bicolon, which is expected in the context,
hence it has been suggested that the original text may have contained two
bicola, a colon having dropped out after tiqwh in v. 7a (Tur-Sinai), or
between yikkr and we, or between we and (Duhm, Bell, Hlscher).
Stevenson regarded v. 7c as a gloss, but this colon agrees with the sequel,
which emphasizes the survival of the tree in its shoots (ynaqt) and goes on
to explode the popular fallacy of a mans survival in his sons (v. 21f.). Bicola,
however, may be relieved by an occasional tricolon in Hebrew and Ugaritic
poetry, and so we should retain the text as it stands. Wetzstein reports such a
means of renewing old fruit trees in Syria (cf. Dalman 1942: VII, 174f.). Cf.
the branch from the stump (geza) of Jesse (Isa. 11.1). For the Hiphil of la
(to renew) cf. 29.20 and possibly Isa. 9.9; 40.31; Ben Sira 46.12.
8. Note r (lit. dust) as parallel to ere, the ground, in view of the
doctrinal implications which have been assumed by some commentators for
r as reecting the dust of the grave; cf. on 19.25.
9. mra mayim (lit. from the scent of the water) recalls bahar , when
it has a touch of re (Judg. 16.9). yara is to be retained in the Hiphil; cf.
yazkn, denominational Hiphil.
qr is a collective sing. (branches); cf. 18.16; 29.19.
10. la describes the reduction of the oppressor in Isa. 14.12 and Exod.
17.13 (probably to be emended to Hiphil). The meaning to be weak is hardly
strong enough for the present passage, and the parallel with ayy, where is
he?, or as has been suggested, ayin or nenn (he is not), indicates that
LXX and he departed (wayyahal) represents the original verb.
11. If the reference is to the natural drying up of waters ym would mean
lake or extensive rain-pond rather than sea (G.B. Gray), there being practically no tide in the Near East. While this is possible, however, the reference
to the river drying up is not. nhr is a perennial river, not a seasonal wadi
(naal), so that this is a case of proverbial exaggeration. Earlier Jewish commentators referred it to drink-offerings, thought in Near Eastern popular
religion partially to revive the dead. Such offerings are attested in the Assyrian
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232
records of Ashurbanipal and in grave installations at Ras Shamra (Schaeffer

1939: pl. XXIX, g. 3.1) and actually at Samaria in the Israelite monarchy
(Sukenik 1945: 42-58) and from a Jewish community in the Hellenistic age in
Tob. 4.17; cf. Lk. 16.19-24 (Parrot 1937). On this explanation the sense would
be you may exhaust all the water in sea and rivers but you will not revive the
dead. Dhorme interprets the passage as the sea and rivers will dry up sooner
than a dead man will rise (so also Horst, Larcher, Terrien, Lvque).
12. The more graphic bel is to be preferred to the negative bilt of MT as in
the same gure in Isa. 51.6 and Ps. 102.27 (EVV 26). For support from ancient
versions see textual note. The sky, as Gods seat, and the heavenly bodies are
proverbial for permanence (Pss. 72.7; 89.36f.), the implication in the divine
oath on the permanence of his favour. For sleep as a gure of death, cf. Isa.
26.19; Dan. 12.2.
13. Gods provision of a temporary refuge (histr) till the passing of a crisis
recalls the language of Pss. 27.5 and 32.7. Those suggest that biel may be a
late addition and indeed it is superuous to the metre. Throughout the OT
Sheol is regularly represented as beyond the inuence of God himself (e.g. Ps.
88.6, 11f. [EVV 5, 10f.]; Isa. 33.18), and as a place from which there is no
return (7.9). Verses 13-17 have the character of an interjection with direct
address to God intervening between the strophes vv. 10-12 and 18-19 on the
evanescence of humanity with their vivid imagery.
14. In view of the unequivocal assertion throughout the chapter on human
mortality without survival it is extremely questionable if the doctrine of
personal survival after death had emerged at all in Judaism at the time of the
denitive edition of the Book of Job. Hence 14a has been taken as a gloss; so
Hlscher, Stevenson, Baumgrtel, Lindblom, Horst, and Fohrer, who regards it
a misplaced from after v. 10a. Verse 14a possibly owes its present position to
a revision of the Book, when the doctrine of resurrection was emerging in
Judaism, but was contested, and may reect the notion of compensation after
death for the trials (b) of life (cf. Lk. 17.17-25), as in Daniel (12.2) and 2
Maccabees (7.9, 14; 112.43-45). , however, need not refer to the whole
of life, but simply to the long period of misery within life, nor need relief
refer to the absolute relief from life in death, which was small comfort to the
sufferer, pace Jobs sentiment in 3.11-22. The question in v. 14a, whatever its
actual provenance, does not open a ray of hope, which at one stroke would
deprive the Book of its problem; it is a rhetorical question tantamount to a
negation, and may well emphasize the negation in v. 19c, after which Dhorme
would read it. In v. 14, while disposed to admit occasional tricola in the
general structure of bicola in Job, we must consider each tricolon on its own
merits, with the constant possibility of displaced cola, and here we agree with
Dhorme. On the military metaphor of service () and relief (l), see
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above on 7.1, where, however, refers to the service of a day-labourer,

and 10.17, where both words refer to relays of troops.
15. Gods care for the work of (His) own hands in temporary relief of Jobs
sufferings until a fair hearing is granted reects the language of 10.8ff., where
the suffering which God permits is out of accord with what humans might
expect as the handiwork of the Creator.
The verb ksa, from which the noun kese (silver) is derived, means
primarily to be pale, as with anxiety, hence the meaning here to yearn, or
care for.
16. k-atth has been taken as stating the fact after the hypothesis implied in
the wish in v. 13 and continued in vv. 14bcf. and rendered For then you
would number my steps, you would not keep watch over my sin, so preserving MT l-imr if indicative would contradict the sense of the context. This
is the view expressed in RSV after Budde, Hlscher, Weiser, Horst. In agreement with Jobs general complaint, however, and particularly with what we
understand as the keeping account of Jobs sins in v. 17, we consider this
doubtful. We would take k in the adversative sense, rendering k-atth, but
as it is. In this case MT l-imr would seem to contradict the sense of the
context unless it is taken as a question (so G.R. Driver, Fohrer). We suggest
that the phrase is afrmative, MT l being a scribal misunderstanding of the
asseverative enclitic le as in Ugaritic and Arab. (cf. vv. 29, 24a). In view of the
parallelism with eay (my steps) there may be a word-play between
a (my sin) and a possible Heb. homonym of Arab. awtu(n), footsteps, which might, at least in some degree, be reproduced in English by
transgression.
17. The reference here may be to the recording of charges on a papyrus
document, which was then folded and sealed, instances of which have been
found at Elephantine (ANEP, pl. 265). Pope envisages sins stored up with
tokens in bags as commercial tallies mentioned in the Nuzu texts (Oppenheim
1959). wattipl, from al (to smear with clay or plaster), parallel to m
and particularly err, suggests the sealing up of a bag of money or goods with
wax or some such substance. In this connection it is interesting that a clay
sealing in South Arabian characters was found in ninth-century debris at
Bethel (Van Beek and Jamme 1958), doubtless a relic of the trade in incense, a
precious commodity, which would demand sealing.
16ff. The general sentiment is that humans and their hopes are no more
permanent than inanimate nature, even the eternal hills (Gen. 49.26; Deut.
33.15), which are subject to landslide, detritus and soil-erosion.
18. MT nl yibbl (lit. falling, withers), if correct, may imply the various
modes of ruin sudden and gradual (so Lvque). But Theod. and S suggest the
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reading nl yippl, accepted by Lagarde, Graetz, Siegfried, Beer, Budde,

Dhorme, Larcher, Hlscher, Horst, Fohrer and Lvque. On aq (to be
removed) see on 9.5, also referring to the removal of mountains.
19. aq usually means to pulverize; cf. aaq, the ne dust on the scales in
Isa. 40.15. The poet infers the action of water on rock in the ne detritus in the
bed of the wadi.
MT seeyh, for which the verb ti demands the singular, suggests a
common root with sa, grain accidentally spilled in harvesting (Lev.
25.5) and what grows from it (Lev. 25.11; 2 Kgs 19.29; Isa. 37.30) and mis
(bloodshed) in Isa. 5.7. Thus it is possible that the word means here outpouring. But seh has also been proposed by Budde, citing mr s in
Prov. 28.3 (a driving rain), so here ood.
Fohrer suggests that v. 19c is the rst colon of a bicolon, of which the
second has been lost; cf. Dhormes suggestion that v. 14a is the required
colon, which we have accepted.
20. tq here means obviously overpower. It is found in late sources; cf.
15.24; Eccl. 4.12 and tq in Est. 9.29; 10.2; Dan. 11.17. Hence it is probably
Aram.; cf. tqp (authority) in Nabataean inscriptions; it is well attested in
Aram. lnea, usually meaning for ever, may here, as occasionally, indicate
the superlative utterly (Thomas 1956). yahal might mean to go ones
way, i.e. to die; cf. Ps. 39.14 (EVV 13) and Akk. ana imtu alku (he went
to his fate), cited by Horst; Duhm cites the Nabataean usage of the same verb.
In the present passage, however, the form yahal instead of the normal
Classical Heb. yl, usually taken as late poetic, may possibly be a homonym,
cognate with Arab. halaka (to perish, pass away).
21. The adjective r in the sense both of young and little (cf. Arab. sar,
young, small, insignicant) is well attested in Classical Heb. The verbal root
is found only in comparatively late sources (e.g. Jer. 30.19; Zech. 13.7) and
here in Job.
22. His esh upon him (ber lyw) is intelligible; his life upon him
(na lyw) unusual. Obviously lyw, repeated, must be emphasized, and
that in contrast to the feeling one cannot have for the vicissitudes of ones
family after ones death. Thus al with the prepositional sufx emphasizes the
intimate and personal nature of the experience. The experience and interest of
the subject is concentrated in his present life, indicated by the conjunction of
his esh (ber) and his animation (na), and does not extend beyond it.
Job 15
ELIPHAZS SECOND REPLY: A REMONSTRATION
TO JOBS OBSTINACY IN QUESTIONING THE THEODICY
The address falls into two parts, vv. 2-16 in four strophes (vv. 2-6, 7-10, 1113, 14-16), where Eliphaz remonstrates with Job, and six strophes (vv. 17-19,
20-22, 23-25, 26-28, 29-32 and 32-35), where Gods providence in the moral
order in the retribution of the wicked is asserted.
The literary afnity of the rst half is with the controversial pieces in
Wisdom literature where an opponents personal authority and his doctrine is
challenged, often by a succession of questions, but also by direct statements.
The second part is cast in the form of the instruction of the sage (I shall
declare to you. Hear me, vv. 15-17), the substance of his instruction being
the traditional view borne out by personal experience that sin brought its own
retribution.
From this point the debate sharpens, and Job turns progressively from his
friends to God, while they no longer temper their admonitions with encouragement, except, briey, the more mature Eliphaz (22.21-30). If the friends do not
keep silence as Job suggests (13.5), their statements are less direct arguments
related to Jobs case than sharp invective motivated by professional pique
(15.9-10; 18.3; 20.3) at Jobs critical attitude to traditional Wisdom to which
they served themselves heirs (15.2-13; 18.1-4), and seek to overwhelm him
with the weight of garnered wisdom that has been handed down by wise men
(15.18-19) on the theme of sin and retribution in the colourful, indeed often
lurid, language of Proverbs (15.20-35; 18.5-21; 20.4-29), many aphorisms of
which are cited. Besides, Eliphaz but reiterates the argument that God is
beyond the imputation of injustice by frail humans in a passage (15.11-16)
which, from its allusion to a word spoken in consolation (15.11), obviously
refers to his statement in 4.15-21. In their introductory invective Eliphaz and
Bildad both charge Job with arrogating to himself special knowledge of the
mind of God (15.8), as though he was the rst of humankind (15.7), whose
case transcended Cosmic Order (18.4).
236
Job 15. Eliphazs Second Reply
Chapter 15
1.
And Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said:
2.
Does a wise man answer with knowledge that is mere wind,

And ll his belly with the hot blast,
Argue with unprotable argument,
And with words which are useless?
You annul reverence for God,
You detract from serious thought vis--vis God,
For your sin prompts your speech,
And you choose a crafty tongue.
Your own mouth condemns you and not I,
And your (own) lips testify against you.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
Were you born the rst of men,

Or were you brought forth in travail before the hills?
Are you admitted to listen in on the intimate counsel of God?
And do you assert a monopoly of wisdom?
What do you know that we do not know,
Or perceive that is unfamiliar to us?
The grey-haired and the aged are among us,
Older than your father.
Are the consolations of God too little for you,
(Our) word spoken1 in gentleness to you?
How your heart prompts you to behave shamelessly,2
And how haughty3 are your eyes,
That you let your anger recoil on4 God
And spout words from your mouth!
What is man that he may be pure,
One born of woman that he may be innocent?
Lo, even his holy ones5 he does not trust,
And the heavens are not pure in his sight,
How much less one who is abhorrent and corrupt,
A man who drinks up wrong like water!
I will enlighten you, listen to me,
And of what I have seen I will tell6 you,
What the sages declare,
And their fathers did not conceal,7
To whom alone the land was given,
No stranger having come in to settle among them.
The wicked man is anxious all his days,
The years laid up for the wicked are few.8
The sound of ocks is in his ears;
Even when he is secure the spoiler shall come upon him.
He cannot rely on getting free of darkness
And he is marked off9 for destruction.10
The Book of Job

23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
237
He is apportioned11 as food12 for the vultures,13

He knows that his collapse14 is certain.
The dark day overwhelms him,15
Distress and anguish overpower him
Like the striding warrior16 ready to attack,
Because he lifted his hand against God,17
Deed18 the Almighty.
He charges him19 with a horde,
With the mass of his shield-bosses;
Yea, he covered his face with fat,20
And put fat on his loins;
And he occupied ruined cities,
Houses which are uninhabited,
Which threaten to fall into ruin-heaps.
He will not be rich, nor will his wealth endure,
Nor will his possessions21 reach the underworld.
( )22 His shoot the ame shall parch,
And his blossom23 shall be blasted24 by the wind.
Let one not trust in its generosity25
For its dates shall come to naught;
It will wilt26 before its maturity,
And its frond will not grow green.
His unripe grapes will remain sour27 on the vine;28
And cast its blossom like an olive tree.
For the company of the godless is barren,
And re will devour the tents of corruption.
He is pregnant with trouble and gives birth to evil,
His belly29 gestates delusion.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
1
Reading with T the verbal noun dabbr for MT dr, which is nevertheless
intelligible.
Reading mah-yya libbe for MT mah-yyiqaa libbek. See Commentary ad
loc.
Reading termeyn for MT yizremn. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading al for MT el.
Reading qeyw with Qere for MT (Kethib) qdw.
Reading asapprh (pausal) after LXX, S and V for MT waasapprh.
Reading wel kiam am for MT wel kia mam. Another possibility
is wel nia mam (which were not concealed from their fathers),
assuming omission of n before k in the Old Heb. script.
Reading mispr for MT mispar. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading wey for MT wes, with omission of y before h in the Old Heb. script.
Reading re for MT re (pausal).
Reading n for MT n. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading leleem for MT lalleem.
Reading ayyh for ayyh (where?) with LXX.
238
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.

Reading p for MT bey.
Reading yeaah for MT yeaauh.
Reading mehakl for MT mele. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading lyw for MT lyw.
Reading le for MT elb, assuming a dittograph of nal w before the following
w in the Old Heb. script.
Reading menl for MT minlm. See Commentary ad loc.
Omitting l-ysr minn-e as a gloss on v. 22a displaced to its present
position. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading pir with LXX for MT pw.
Reading wsar for MT weysr; cf. Hos. 13.3.
Reading be for MT bew nih. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading timml for MT timml. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yam for MT yams, assuming corruption of to s in the Old Heb.
script.
Reading baggeen for MT kaggeen, assuming scribal corruption of b to k in the
square script.
Reading bin for binm, with corruption of w to m in the Old Heb. script.
2. In daa-ra there is a double entendre. The word ra, as in 7.7 and 16.3,
and, as the parallel with qm (the east wind or sirocco) suggests, indicates
wind in the sense here of emptiness. It might also mean inspiration. In
Jobs reply to Eliphaz in 16.3 the word-play is more pronounced.
3. On ha (to argue, criticize) see above on 5.17. san (to be helpful)
is peculiar to Job; cf. 22.2 and 35.3, where, as here, it is parallel to hl. This
implies the allegation of inanity in Jobs windy words.
4. tr, from prar, means to break, literally as in 16.12 (wayearpern,
and he has shattered me), or to violate (e.g. a covenant), or to frustrate
(e.g. ordered government or judgment, 40.8), or, as here, to annul; cf. Ps.
89.34, asd l r mimm (I shall not annul my covenant love with
him). yireh, here used absolutely, means fear or reverence of God,
expressed in practical piety; cf. Arab. taqw (fear of God, piety). It is the
comprehensive Heb. term for religion. gra means to withdraw, either in
the sense of subtract, hence diminish as in the tally of bricks in Exod. 5.8,
19, or remove, as at 36.7. It may denote removing to oneself, as, for
example, in 36.27 (drawing drops of water), or monopolizing (15.8).
a or h is meditation or serious thought; cf. Ps. 119.97, 99. Job is
here criticized for his extreme humanist approach to the problems of life and
the divine involvement, having of his own initiative and insight chosen the
language of the worldly astute (armm, v. 5). NEB renders v. 4b usurping
1
The Book of Job
239
the sole right to speak in the divine presence. But a, though meaning to
talk about in Judg. 5.10 (possibly), and Prov. 6.22, with direct object, means
more often to meditate, think seriously (Pss. 77.7, 13; 119.15, 23, 27, 48, 78,
97, 99); cf. Amos 4.13: magg lm mah- (who declared to humanity
what are its thoughts). We take lien to mean about or vis--vis.
5. Your sin prompts your speech (lit. your sin teaches your mouth) is an
accusation of casuistic self-exculpation.
6. nh be (lit. to answer against) is a common expression for to testify
against, attested, as here, with mouth or speech as subject in 2 Sam. 1.16.
7. Whether or not this passage presupposes the conception of Gods wisdom as
the agent of his creation, the theme of Proverbs 8, esp. vv. 22-31, as Dhorme
supposes (1926: 191), the language recalls that passage (cf. Ps. 90.2). Insofar
as this verse signies anything beyond the mere age of humans, it may animadvert upon the plan of God in creation (before the hills) as a manifestation
of his wisdom, to which humanity as the last stage of his creation was not
admitted. This emphasis on the transcendent nature of Gods wisdom recurs in
the address of Zophar in 11.7-9 and particularity in the speeches of Elihu
(36.24ff.; 37.24), and in the Divine Declaration in 38.2ff. On the other hand it
may reect the myth of the primaeval man to which Ezekiel refers (28.1-2,
12ff.), which has a counterpart in Mesopotamian mythology in the myth of the
primaeval humans created not only before the animals but before plants and
physical features after the earth.
8. s denotes either the intimate counsel of God, as in Amos 3.7, or intimate
company, as in Job 19.19; Pss. 55.15 (EVV 14); 64.3 (EVV 2); Ezek. 13.9. It
also denotes Gods privy council (Jer. 23.18). Job 15.8 could refer to Gods
counsel or council, but the passage recalls Jer. 23.18 in his taunting question
regarding the false prophets, which Eliphaz may consciously re-echo.
10. y means aged without the sense of decrepitude as in 12.12. kabbr in
the sense of old is regular in the Arab. cognate. The verbal and adjectival
forms of the root are practically conned to Job in the OT, where Aramaism is
likely. The word occurs in Phoenician inscriptions meaning great, but is
more common in Aram. inscriptions from the eighth century BCE and later
literary sources.
11. tanum l (the consolations of God) means the consolations of Jobs
friends in their rst addresses, which they considered inspired by God and
were designed to turn Job in faith to God for assurance, like the milder tone of
Eliphazs rst address with his counsel of supplication and hope of rehabilitation (5.8ff.). There may also be a reference to the inspired words of Eliphaz in
1
240
4.12ff. dabbr la (MT dr) (our word spoken in gentleness) refers
particularly to Eliphazs rst address to Job.
12. MT yiqqa is pointed as if from lqa (to take), which is generally
accepted. G.R. Driver (1948: 235) associated the word with Arab. waqia (to
behave shamelessly, be bold), which suggests a reading mah-yyqak, lit.
what has made you shameless?, being the regular form of exclamation in
Arab., how shameless you are! rzm is generally taken as a metathetic cognate
of remaz found in Aram., Syr. and Late Heb., meaning to make signs, wink.
This is not very apt in the present context. In view of Drivers interpretation of
the parallel verb we may seriously consider the variant in one Heb. MS
yerm, cf. haughty eyes. In the localization of moral qualities or propensities in parts of the body, arrogance is specically associated with the eyes; cf.
Prov. 6.17; 30.13. See further textual note.
13. ra here may mean rather anger as in Judg. 8.3 and Prov. 16.32 (so
LXX). Dhorme emphasizes from your mouth, i.e. hasty words instead of
considered utterance from the heart. Words (milln again with the Aram.
ending if the text is sound) may have the same emphasis. Here Pope translates
Spouting words from your mouth, which with slight modication we have
adopted. Duhm proposed mer (rebellion), which would be a much more
colourful expression, but the ancient versions are unanimous in support of MT.
14. The synonyms en and yel ih recall m and yel ih in 14.1,
emphasizing the frailty of humanity.
15. The transcendence of God and his plans even beyond the angels, here
holy ones as in 5.1, is expressed already in 4.18, where his servants is
parallel to his angels.
mayim is not a circumlocution for angels (T and Rashi), but denotes the
sky in its purity; cf. Exod. 24.10 (Driver and Gray 1921: 135). So pure
(zakk) is used in its physical sense. The sentiment recalls the formula of
emancipation in administrative tablets from the palace of Ras Shamra which
declares an emancipated slave clear (br) as the sun is clear (brt).
16. On a k (how much less) as a formula of a fortiori reasoning, see on
4.19.
neel is a rare word, found only here and in Pss. 14.3 and 53.4. It is a
moral term in the OT without any trace of physical connotation, but the Arab.
cognate alaa in the VIIIth form is used of milk turning sour.
A man who drinks up wrong like water, i.e. lives by it as a daily necessity,
or with the same natural ease, recalls Elihus charge that Job drinks up
scofng like water (34.7).
1
The Book of Job
241
17. On the verb iwwh (to explain, reveal) see on 13.17.

On the reading asappr (pausal form), see textual note. zeh is the relative
particle, Ugaritic and Aram. de; cf. Arab. maa; and see 19.19 and Ps. 68.9.
In citing the insights of the older sages he does not exclude his personal
experience (what I have seen, 4.7). In our reading kia-m am for MT
kiad mam the enclitic m with the verb is to be noted as in Ugaritic
(N.M. Sarna, Some Instances of the Enclitic m in Job, JSS 6 [1955], p. 110).
19. This relative clause with the relative particle omitted, as often in poetry.
The Jewish author momentarily forgets the origin of Eliphaz beyond Israel.
The golden age of tradition from the viewpoint of the writer of Job after the
Exile was the days of the settlement in Palestine before the traditional faith
were corrupted by extraneous humanistic philosophy. The passage recalls
Joels conception of Jerusalem and the Temple uncontaminated by foreign
inuences as the repository of the heritage of Israel (Joel 3.17; cf. Isa. 52.1). In
support of the meaning to settle for ar Fohrer cites as a cognate Arab.
abara with this meaning.
20. It is characteristic of the more mature Eliphaz that in contrast to the others
he does not elaborate on the temporary success of the wicked before their
downfall (cf. Pss. 10.2-11; 73.4-12), but assumes their success, haunted by
constant fear, under the sword of Damocles, and their inevitable end. Where
he does expatiate on the career of the arrogant tyrant in the ush of his power
(Job 15.26-28) he is probably animadverting on Jobs challenge to God,
though in justice to Job his challenge is for a fair hearing and not aggressive
deance. mill means to be tormented, the Hithpolel of l or l (to
writhe in pain or anxiety) as here; cf. hialal (Est. 4.4). This suits the
context better than the reading mihll, shows his folly (so Theod., Margolis) or boasts (so S, V, Beer). MT mispar nm may mean a certain
number of years, which in Heb. idiom would rather be en mispr. nipen
indicates a plur. subject. While mispar nm might be taken as a plural, we
should take the verb in a relative clause of which nm is the antecedent, and
mispar, read as mispr, being the predicate, and as being emphasized by its
position.
21. We should notice a conscious word-play here between the homonyms
paa (terror) and a cognate of Arab. faad(u) (ock); cf. Gordon UT Aqht
V.17, 22f. imr bpd (a lamb from the ock), and Akk. pudu (Gordon UT
1628). The picture of the rich man in apparent security (balm) is particularized by his hearing the bleating of his ocks, soon to be the prey of the
spoiler ().
22. MT l yaamn minni-oe (he does not believe that he will come
back from darkness), though the anxiety of the wicked man is emphasized in
1
242
the passage, does not accord with the general emphasis on the condence of
such. Hence we should render the verb as rely rather than believe. For
NEB renders escape; cf. Fohrer entkommt. This is obviously the sense, and we
suggest that the verb is cognate with Arab. ba, imperf. yabu, which is used
of beasts let free on the range. This would also be most apt at 33.30, lehb
na minn-aa (to deliver his life from the pit) and Ps. 35.17.
MT emended to py (Qere) is preferable. G.R. Driver (1955: 78)
takes the verb h in the sense of to mark down, after Ps. 37.32, where the
verb is parallel to biqq; he cites the Ass. ip (to surround, enclose, delimit,
mark off, survey). Alternatively, the verb might be h, familiar in the
Talmud, meaning to choose (so Tur-Sinai); cf. Arab. afa(y) with this meaning in the VIII form. We take the verb as h (to spy out). The passage
may reect the continual dread of the inhabitants of the border lands of being
spied upon and marked down for a raid by Bedouin.
23-24. MT may be arranged as follows:
n h lalleem ayyeh
ya k-nn bey
ym-e yebaauh
ar meqh tiqeph
kemele lakkr
In this passage LXX reads He has been appointed as food for the vultures,
suggesting the reading n h leleem ayyh. The LXX rendering he is
appointed has suggested the emendation n (so Duhm, Buttenwieser,
Hlscher, Kissane), m (Beer), n, is known (Dhorme). Fohrer and
Pope retain MT n (wandering), reading leleem ayyh (as food for
vultures), envisaging one who has lost his way and perished in the desert. MT
is retained by G.B. Gray, Weiser and Horst meaning he wanders about for
bread (saying), Where is it? We would read n for MT n, taking the
verb as cognate with Ugaritic ndd (to apportion); cf. Gordon UT nt I.8: q
mri ndd (he apportioned slices of fatlings), which accords with the rendering of LXX. Horsts objection that olh and not leem would have been
used for food is invalid in view of the general meaning food in the Ras
Shamra texts and often in poetry in the OT and of the verb lm (to eat) in the
Ras Shamra texts; cf. Arab. lamu(n) (meat). ayyh is mentioned as a keensighted bird in 28.7 and listed among the unclean birds in Lev. 11.14 and
Deut. 14.13. Hence vulture would be most apt. In the second colon LXX
reads he knows in himself that he is ready for a fall. A fall has suggested
the emendation of MT bey, e.g. to le (he is ready [nn] for calamity),
or p (his collapse, so Wright, Ball, Dhorme, Hlscher, Tur-Sinai, Stevenson, Kissane, Horst, Fohrer, Pope). In the third colon in the above arrangement
the verb should be singular in agreement with the subject ym e.
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The Book of Job
243
24. On tqa in the sense to overpower, see on 14.20. In v. 24a the agreement of the singular verb is with the nearer subject meqh. The necessary
connection between the king (mele) and ready to attack ( lakkr) is
most unlikely in this context, and Hoffmans conjecture (1931: 144), mehall
for MT mele, is feasible, especially in the light of Prov. 6.11:
-kimehall re
masre ke mn
Here mehall is taken variously as highwayman and vagabond. On the

evidence of the Ras Shamra texts mn could mean either shield or
petition. The more striking gure would be that of a warrior, probably
reecting the all too familiar experience of soldiers living off the country
through which they passed. On the other hand, the man with the shield would
describe the gurine of Reshef, the god who slew men in mass in war or
plague, who was conventionally depicted as an armed warrior striding out
(mehall) in a short kilt with a shield (ke mn) in bronzes from Palestine
and Syria in the Late Bronze Age and Egyptian sculpture from the same
period. Alternatively the word may mean destroyer, cognate with Arab.
halaka (to destroy). This may be envisaged in Job 15.24. kr is not attested
elsewhere in the OT, but in the context it is obviously cognate with Arab.
kedara (VIIIth form), meaning to dart upon (as a hawk on its prey); cf. Syr.
qadr (hawk).
25. higabbr is used in a good sense of God in Isa. 42.13 (to show himself
mighty), or, as here, to act deantly. The latter is the nuance of the Arab.
cognate jabbru(n) (bully, giant).
26. MT beawwr has suggested the literal translation with a neck. This, in
view of the English slang hard neck and German Hartnckigkeit, is
deceptively intelligible; cf. NEB with the head down and V with neck erect.
Tur-Sinais hauberk, i.e. neck-armour, German Halsberge, is not attested in
Heb. The ancient versions do not help. Aq., Sym. and Theod. attest MT, but
arrogantly in LXX and Jeromes commentary, if they indicate MT, seems a
paraphrase. If Dhorme is right in taking MT gabb minnyw (bosses of his
shields) as interlocked shields like like the Roman testudo (tortoise), which
the plural would seem to suggest, then awwr may be cognate with Arab.
awru(n) (a herd of oxen), hence horde. This, rather than the reference to
the neck of a single warrior, is suggested by the plural gabb minnyw.
27. The fat of the prosperous wicked and oppressor was proverbial in the OT;
cf. Jer. 5.28; Ps. 73.7. Fat characterizes the materialist, clogging humanity,
spiritual susceptibility and intelligence (Ps. 119.70).
244
28. The Niphal of ka in the sense of to be effaced or to be deserted (of

land, probably signifying the effacing of landmarks) is attested in Zech. 11.9,
16, and in the Hiphil meaning to wipe out, destroy in Exod. 23.23 (of the
Amorites in Canaan) and 1 Kgs 13.34 (of the House of Jeroboam). MT lm,
which it is proposed to emend, may be retained as an ethic dative. hiatte is
attested only here, the Piel being attested in Prov. 24.27 in the sense of to
prepare; cf. in v. 23 and 3.8, ready, prepared to. It expresses what is
urgent or imminent, hence in reference to houses which threaten to fall into
ruin-heaps (gallm); cf. Jer. 9.10; 51.37; 2 Kgs 19.25 = Isa. 37.26. The colon
is suspected as a gloss (so Fohrer).
29. yqm means here to be established. minlm is the problem in v. 29b.
LXX renders the Heb. original at this point as shadow, which has suggested
the emendation illm (their shadow), perhaps ill (his shadow), not a
drastic emendation in the Old Heb. script. The conception may be that he will
not live till sunset. Alternatively, the gure might be that of a wide-spreading
tree or the spreading vine in Ps. 80.9-11 (EVV 8-10), cited by Dhorme. V, in
rendering their root, indicates the reading elm, of which MT minlm is a
feasible corruption in the Old Heb. script. T reads min lm (of that which
belongs to them, their possessions), which the parallelism suggests. Dahood
is probably right in seeing what was probably originally mnl from a root
nl cognate with Arab. nla, yanl (to give), hence that which is given,
possessions. The nal m of minlm is probably a scribal corruption of w in
the Old Heb. script, and we propose menl in scriptio defectiva. We propose
that ere here as often in the OT and the Ras Shamra texts denotes the underworld. The gure envisages the burial of a king or notable with his wealth or
goods, as in the tombs of pharaohs in what was for the writer of the Book of
Job the vain hope of their use in the afterlife. This meaning of menl is
supported by yeear (be rich) and yl (his wealth).
30. In v. 30a, l-ysr minn-ek, which does not have any obvious
connection with the context, is probably a gloss on v. 22a on the assumption
that means to return (see on v. 22a) (so Bickell, Budde, Siegfried, Duhm,
G.B. Gray, Dhorme, Hlscher, Holst, Fohrer). This eliminates an odd colon
from the prevailing arrangement in bicola. alhee (ame, or the scorching
sirocco), is found in the OT only here and at Ezek. 21.3. It is one of the rare
instances of the formation of a noun from a verbal root with preformative ,
which is known as the preformative of the causative variation of the root in
Akk., Ugaritic and vestigially in Aram.; cf. abbll (snail, that which makes
wet) in Ps. 58.9. For weysr, which is unintelligible in the context, the
emendation weyissr (and it will be blasted) has been proposed by Beer,
Budde et al.; cf. Perles, Duhm, Oort, Fohrer, who propose wsar (Pual). This
sustains the gure, and suggests the emendation of MT pw to pir (its
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The Book of Job
245
blossom), which is read by Beer, Budde, Ball, Dhorme, Hlscher, Stevenson

and Fohrer.
31. MT al-yaamn baw nih is a notorious crux. LXX paraphrases and
ignores the main difculty. S he does not believe in the falsehood which leads
astray, and T he does not believe in a son of man who errs in falsehood,
conrm MT without translating it accurately, and the ancient versions are also
vague and confused about v. 30c, nor is there any more agreement among
commentators. G.B. Gray accepts MT, rendering:
Let him trust not in emptiness, deceiving himself,
For emptiness will be his return for what he does.
While this is a feasible rendering of MT, it interrupts the gure in the passage,
and so the verse has been taken as a gloss (so Hlscher, Horst, Fohrer).
Alternatively, accepting the original of the passage, it is proposed to nd a
reference to the unreliability of the wealth of the wicked (reading ar,
wealth, for MT w nih), and what it might buy them (temr), lit. his
exchanging, i.e. trade; cf. Ruth 4.7; Job 20.18; so T. In view of the gure of a
fruit-tree in what precedes and follows, however, this is unlikely. The complex
w nih may be a corruption of , the feminine form of a verbal noun
either from the root ya cognate with Arab. waaa (to enrich, used of
Gods favours) or from a verb h unattested in the OT, but cognate with
Ugaritic y, to give (Gordon UT 62.56; 127.59), or perhaps a byform a.
In this assumption we offer the suggestion al-yaamn be (let one not
trust in its generosity). Houbigant suggested the reading temr (his palmtree) for MT temr. Certainly kipp in v. 32b indicates a palm-tree,
meaning generally branch, but specically palm-frond in Ass.; cf. Isa. 9.13
and 19.15, where in contrast to the reed it may denote the frond of the lofty
palm. The reference to shoot (ynaqt) and blossom (pir) is to the fruit
of the palm-tree, dates (Arab. tamru[n]) rather than to the tree, to which the
pronominal sufx may rather refer. tmr is well-attested in Heb. but not
tamar or tamrh meaning date, though such a word is not unlikely. Hence
we propose that MT temrh is a corruption of tamrh with dittography of w
after m in the Old Heb. script. We propose the reading:
al-yaamn be
k w tihyeh tamr.
Alternatively, for MT w nih, we might suggest h (its nobility [of

stature]); cf. the palm-tree (tmr) with the cedar as a symbol of stature and
ourishing in Ps. 92.12 (EVV 11).
32. Continuing the gure of the fruit-tree or date-palm we read after LXX, V, S
and Graetz, Hoffmann, Perles, Budde, G.B. Gray, Dhorme, Beer, Hlscher,
Stevenson and Fohrer:
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246
bel-ym timml
weipp l raannh
It will wilt before its time,
And its palm-frond will not grow green.
33. The vine, it has been observed (Friedrich Delitzsch), does not cast its
grapes before they are ripe (MT bisr), but they may remain on the vine
without ripening. In this case the vine that in apparently failing to supply the
necessary nutriment to the fruit might be said to do it violence (yams), but
this is not a natural expression. We would suggest that the original text read
yam baggeen bosr (his unripe grapes shall remain sour on the vine),
assuming scribal corruption of to s in the Old Heb. script. The vocalization
bser and not bser, as assumed in MT, is attested in Isa. 18.5 and in the popular proverb in Jer. 31.29f. and Ezek. 18.2. The olive tree on the other hand
does shed its blossom not only in its fruitful years, after pollination, but
without fruition every year (Dalman 1928: I, 381; 1935: IV, 165, 300).
34. aa n (the company of the godless) recalls aa addqm in Ps. 1.5
and aa rem in Ps. 22.17, etc. The noun should not be pressed to mean an
ideological society in view of the use of the word in aa derm (swarm of
bees) in Judg. 14.8, though it does denote specically the community at
Qumran. On n see above on 8.15.
35. On galm (barren) see on 3.7. The innitives absolute hrh and yl
emphasize the verbs and make them more graphic; cf. GKC, 113ff. On the
general sentiment with slight variation, see on 5.6f. In v. 35b LXX and S read
tl (contain) for MT tn, which Dhorme would retain, seeing a reference
to the preparation of the embryo in the womb. This is now conrmed by the
Ras Shamra texts, for example in Gordon UT 51 IV.48, nt V.44:
r il abh
il mlk dyknnh
The Bull El her father,

El the King who begot her.
Cf. the title of the mother-goddess Airat in the Ras Shamra texts knyt ilm
(Procreatrix of the gods).
Job 16 and 17
JOBS REJOINDER TO ELIPHAZ
The advance of the argument beyond the mere rebuttal of orthodox objections
to Jobs questioning of the situation of righteous sufferers in Gods economy
is marked by the summary reply of Job to his friends in the rst part of his
statement (16.2-4b, 4c-6) as compared with the more lengthy statement of his
grievances against God (16.7-9b, 12-14, 15-17, 18-22) and the statement of his
sufferings (17.1-4, 5-7, 11-13, 14-16).
In the rst part of Jobs reply (16.2-4b, 4c-6) the literary form is the
sapiential controversy. The second part (vv. 7-9b, 12-14, 15-17, 18-22) is cast
in the form of an appeal against an adversary in the law-court, including a
protestation of innocence and appeal for vindication (vv. 18-22).This has
much in common with the psalm of the type the Plaint of the Sufferer from
which it borrows gures and phraseology, particularly in 13, 15-16. Jobs
statement of his cumulative griefs and his hopeless prospect follows this
pattern.
Job 16.9c-11, where the sufferings of Job are at the hands of the wicked and
not, as in the context, of God, are probably a secondary expansion cited from a
plaint of the sufferer, v. 11 (God delivers me up to wrong-doers) being
possibly an adaptation of the insertion to the context, another sapiential gloss
in the interests of orthodoxy in 17.8-10:
The righteous are shocked at this,
And the innocent is indignant at the impious;
But let the righteous man hold to his way,
And the pure of heart will gain strength.
But come on again, all of you,
I shall not nd a wise man among you.
The incongruity of v. 8 with Jobs attitude and argument has been noted, and
the interruption of Jobs lament between vv. 7 and 11. The passage has
therefore been taken either as a gloss (so Hlscher, Fohrer; cf. Duhm, who
takes it as a gloss on Bildads statement at 18.3) or displaced. Stevenson
suggested it followed 18.21 in Bildads speech (cf. Kissane, who regards v. 10
in place, but reads v. 8 after 18.20 and v. 9 after 18.21).
Thus in his reply to Eliphazs statement in ch. 15 Job indicates that he is as
familiar with the inherent disability and jeopardy of the wicked and his
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Job 16 and 17. Jobs Rejoinder to Eliphaz
miserable end as Eliphaz or any other sage (2.4a). He animadverts on troublesome comforters, referring, argumentum ad hominem, to their windy words
(16.3; cf. 15.2). Job seems to hint that sympathy rather than argument and
indictment might have been more apt to this situation (3-5). His reply to
Bildad is also summary and in the same vein (19.2-5, 21f.), while in his reply
to Zophar he claims a patient and sympathetic hearing (21.2-6). The switch to
Jobs main theme of his plea to God for justice, prefaced by his statement of
false accusation in the language of the Plaint of the Sufferer in such a case is
indicated by a-atth (v. 7). This occupies the bulk of Jobs reply to Eliphaz
and a similar proportion of his reply to Bildad (19.6-20).
Chapter 16
1.
Then Job answered and said:
2.
I have heard many things like these;

Troublesome comforters are you all.
Is there a limit to windy words?
And1 how aggravating is your retort!
I too could talk like you.
Would that you yourselves were in my place!
3.
4a.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
1
Then2 I could elaborate (the case) against you with words

And wag my head at you,
Or I could strengthen you3 with what I had to say,
And sympathy would move my lips unceasingly.4
My sorrow, if spoken, would not be checked,
And if I would keep silent, how freely would it ow out!
But now malice5 has worn me out;
Every one of my associates [8a] seized upon me.6
7One has testied against me and risen up in enmity against me,
A false accuser of me8, testifying against me to my face.
His anger has made me a prey and persecuted me,
He has gnashed his teeth at me.
My enemies look daggers9 at me.
They have gaped at me with their mouths,
They have buffeted my cheeks in insult,
Together they gang up against me.
God delivers me up to wrong-doers,
And throws me into the power of the wicked.7
I was at ease and he worried me,
He took me by the neck and shook me limb from limb.
Yea, he set me up as a target,
His archers10 surrounded me;
He gashes my kidneys without pity
Pouring out my gall on the ground.
He breaks in on me breach upon breach,
He charges me like a warrior.
The Book of Job

15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
249
Sack-cloth have I sewn on my skin,

And I have abased my horn in the dust;
My face is reddened with weeping,
And on my eyes is darkness,
Though there is no violence on my hands,
And I may pray in all innocence.
O earth, cover not my blood,
Neither let there be a place for my owing blood.11
Lo, I have a witness in heaven,
And one who will testify for me on high,
One who will interpret for me12 my cry13 to God,
One for whom14 my eye is ever wakeful,
That he might argue with God for a man
As a man argues for another;
For a few years shall come
And I shall go on a road where I shall not return.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
Reading mah-yyamre for MT mah-yyamre. See Commentary ad loc.

Then is not expressed in MT, but is inserted to introduce the apodosis after the
hypothesis implied in the exclamation in b.
Reading aamme, assuming haplography of .
Reading l ya; cf. LXX and S l e.
Conjecturing imm for MT haimm. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading tiqmen for MT wattiqmen constructed with v. 7b.
Vv. 8-10 are taken as a secondary expansion, with v. 11 as an introduction to vv.
12ff.
Reading ke for MT kaa. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading plur. throughout for MT sing. after S and Sym., which agrees with the plur.
in the sequel.
Readinq ryw for MT rabbyw.
Reading leze for MT lezaaq. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading mel for MT melay.
Reading r after LXX for MT ry (pausal).
Reading lyw, assuming its omission by haplography after el-elah, with confusion of y in the Old Heb. script.
Commentary to Chapter 16.1-21

2. menaam ml may be a case of double entendre, troublesome comforters according to the regular meaning of niam in the OT, and possibly a
hitherto unrecognized cognate of Arab. naama (to pant), hence breathers
out of trouble, as suggested by D.W. Thomas (193233: 192), which would
accord with dier-ra in the following colon.
3. dier-ra (windy words) is Jobs pointed reply to the same allegation of
Eliphaz (15.2) and Bildad (8.2). mah-yyamre (lit. what makes you sick?)
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250
might signify that Eliphazs urge to enter into altercation with Job was a
disease. T renders what amuses you?, which suggests a reading yamle,
which might mean what makes you so agreeable? (cf. Ps. 119.102). While
this would be an apt ironic retort, it is not graphically a feasible original for
corruption to yamrek, and would seem to be inuenced by Ps. 119.103,
mah-nnimleimerey (how pleasant are your words!; MT imere).
We would see in the expression in MT correspondence with the Arab. idiom
used in interjection with ma with the causative and the direct object, hence our
rendering How aggravating you are
4. l might mean if introducing the protasis, signifying remote possibility
in a conditional sentence. We would regard the sequel in vv. 4c-6 as the
apodosis, but take the alternative signicance of l introducing the optative,
which nevertheless still implies a protasis.
taa na (lit. in the place of me myself) is paralleled in the account of
the succession of kings taat aw (in place of his father) in Kings. In v. 4c
the verb in MT abrh is found in the sense of making (binding) spells
(Deut. 18.11; Ps. 58.6 [EVV 5]). It might signify to associate, that is, compose words or arguments (so Renan). Finkelstein (1956) proposes that the verb
means to make a noise as in the brawling household (b eer) with the
nagging wife (Prov. 21.9; 25.24); so also O. Loretz (1961), who cites the Akk.
verb uburu (to make a din). The word might be a denominative Hiphil from
r (friend, associate), but alem (against you) is against this interpretation, as also na (to shake the head), this not being, like n, an expression of sympathy, as in 2.11, but a gesture of mockery or gratication that
the suffering of another conrms the conventional view of the theodicy (e.g.
2 Kgs 19.21 = Isa. 37.22; Pss. 22.8; 109.25; Lam. 2.15). It is suggested that the
verb here is cognate with Arab. abara (to embellish, especially rhetoric [so
Fohrer]), which we accept. In vv. 4-6, Job declares that if roles were reversed
he could, rather than would, be as eloquent and censorious as his friends or
(reading before aammieem) encourage and console (n) them.
5. The positive sense of 5a seems to support the negative with the verb yaa
(would not restrain, i.e. move unceasingly), n or n (nodding of the
head, i.e. consolation, sympathy), being the subject and lips (eay), i.e.
speech, the object. This we accept, though admitting that MT might still be
retained in the sense that sympathy (n) would restrain (yaa) or temper
what Job had to say (eay) (so Ehrlich, citing Prov. 10.19).
6. im aabberh is a case of the cohortative in a hypothesis or contingent
intention, as in Ps. 139.8-9, and, without im, in Job 19.18 (GKC, 108e).
Dhorme suggests that mah in mah-mminn yahal is negative (so V, also
Hlscher), as in Arab. This is unnecessary as mah-mminn yahal may be an
exclamation, describing Jobs reaction to his friends suffering if the occasion
arose. ke therefore is his sympathetic grief.
1
The Book of Job
251
7. a-atth signals the return to the actual case after the hypothesis. The verb
heln requires a subject, which Dhorme nds in the otherwise awkward
haimm pointed haimm, which he takes as cognate with Arab. amita
(to rejoice in anothers misfortune) and renders the malicious one. We
would accept the association with the Arab. verb, but would take imm as an
abstract noun immt analogous in form to iqq, omitting h as a dittograph
of preceding y in the Old Heb. script, and rendering malice, taking it as
belonging to v. 7a, and attaching wattiqmen of v. 8a to v. 7b. kol-a may
be retained as meaning all my associates, the fem. sing. abstract having the
force of a collective noun as in Heb. yee (inhabitants), glh, (exiles),
yee (enemies), and in Ugaritic, for example, tdt p nhr (the witnesses
of River the Ruler, Gordon UT 137.26) and r (enemies, Gordon UT 68.9).
8. The verb qma occurs in the OT only here and at 22.16, but it is well
known in Aram. and Syr. meaning to seize, compress, with an Arab. cognate
qamaa (to bind together). be is used, as regularly, to express hostility, and
the present passage suggests qm- -eqer (false witnesses have risen
against me) in Ps. 27.12. The verb kaa in Ps. 109.24 means to fall away
(subject esh), which suggests to Hlscher, Fohrer and Lvque the rendering leanness (so Rowley and RSV). But the root is better attested in Hos. 7.3;
10.13; 12.1; Nah. 3.1; Isa. 30.9, and possibly Ps. 59.12 (EVV 11) meaning
falsehood. So after Isa. 30.9, bnm kem, we would read ke (my false
accuser; so Delitzsch, Dhorme, Peters, Kissane and Stevenson). nh be (lit.
to answer against, to testify against) is a regular usage in the OT. beny
could mean simply against me, but pnay should probably be emphasized,
meaning to my face.
9. For app ra (his wrath made [me] a prey), cf. Amos 1.11, which is,
however, generally emended after Jer. 3.5, S and V to yir app. am,
and particularly the MT of the present passage, is supported by be yiemn
(they persecute me in anger) in Ps. 55.4. raq is well known, to gnash the
teeth in the Plaint of the Sufferer in the Psalms (e.g. Pss. 35.16; 37.12), a gesture of mocking, anger (Acts 7.54) or of misery and regret (Mt. 8.12). For
yil nyw l (he sharpens his eyes at me; cf. whetting a sword in Ps. 7.13
[MT 12]), is a daring, but not unintelligible, gure (cf. English looking
daggers).
9c, 10. The change to the plur. is abrupt, the subjects being indenite, and the
sufferings of Job elaborated in the convention, style and language of the Plaint
of the Sufferer in the Psalms, as in vv. 8-9 as distinct from vv. 11ff., where the
subject is God, suggesting that vv. 8-10, and certainly vv. 9c-10, is a secondary insertion (so G.B. Gray, Hlscher, Fohrer, Lvque). paar behem
(they gapewith their mouths) is repeated in 29.23, indicating a conventional gure from the Plaint of the Sufferer, like the buffeting of the cheeks in
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252
insult (beerph hikk leyy [pausal]); cf. Lam. 3.30; Isa. 50.6; Mic. 4.14;
Mt. 28.67f., where it was the supreme insult. yimalle lay may mean they
mass against me; cf. the band (mel) of shepherds who mass together when a
lion attacks a herd (Isa. 31.4). Alternatively it might mean they support one
another; cf. Arab tamlau alaya (they supported one another against me).
The phrase may be a military gure, referring to general mobilization, mill
(Thomas 1952: 47ff.).
11. For wl, awwl is read in one Heb. MS, indicating a habitually bad man,
which should probably be preferred. In MT yirn, the initial y should be taken
as a radical, suggesting the emendation to the Piel perfect yrean from a root
cognate with Arab. waraa (to throw)so an apt parallel to wayyasgrn
(and he has delivered me up).
12. wayyearpern is the Pilpel of prar, used in the Hithpalel in Isa. 24.19
of an earthquake and in the Polel in Ps. 74.13 of Gods rough handling of the
sea in parallelism with ibbr. G.R. Driver (1955: 78) cites Arab. farfara
(shook), as of a sheep mangled by a beast of prey, hence our translation
worried. In the parallel colon he took the verb wayyeapen as cognate
with Arab. fafaa (to be dismembered). The conception of the sufferer as a
butt for God recalls 7.20, where miga (something to be hit when aimed at)
is used for marh in the present passage, meaning literally something to be
aimed at. More specically the whole passage recalls Lam. 3.12:
dra qat wayyan kammarh lh
he bent his bow and set me up as a target for his arrow.
13. MT rabbyw, where the context demands the meaning his archers, would
be derived from the verb ra (to be numerous), and so should be emended
to rm, from rh (to shoot arrows); cf. Gen. 21.20, reh qee
(archer).
The verb pla (Piel) is used in Prov. 7.23 of an arrow piercing the liver of
an adulterer. Pouring out my gall (merr, lit. my bitterness) on the
ground recalls Lam. 2.11, where ke (my liver) is the object of the same
verb pa. This passage may have suggested v. 13c of the present passage as
a secondary expansion.
14. The gure is now that of an assault upon a fortied city. pra is used of
the breaching of a city wall in 2 Kgs 14.13; Isa. 5.5; Ps. 80.13; etc.; cf. Ass.
paru. al-pen means over and above. In the charge of the warrior (gibbr),
Job may be alluding to Eliphazs gure of the wicked charging God in
deance (15.26).
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253
15. The verb tar (to sew) is rare in the OT, occurring only here, and in
Gen. 3.7 (J), Eccl. 3.7, and in the Piel in Ezek. 13.18. It probably does not
mean here that the coarse, black cloth (aq) was sewn on to the skin, but that it
was stitched for permanent wear and worn next to the skin (gele). This word
is a hapax legomenon in the OT, where r is regular, but it is the regular word
for skin in Ass., Aram. and Arab.
lalt er qarn (and I must lower my horn in the dust), where the
verb is a hapax legomenon in the OT, is now attested in the Ras Shamra text
Gordon UT 137.23, where the gods in shame and humiliation lower their
heads upon their knees (tly ilm rithm lzr brktm). The horn symbolizes
strength as regularly in the OT.
16. omarmer means are reddened (so KoehlerBaumgartner). The root is
not attested in this sense in the OT, but is regular in Arab. (amaru, red).
amarmar (to be in a ferment) in Lam. 1.20; 2.11 (subject may, my
bowels) is evidently a homonym. On aappayim (eyes rather than
eyelids), see on 3.9.
17. al here signies though, the phrase recalling Isa. 53.9, al l-ms h (though he had done no violence).
18-21. Here the writer develops the accepted belief in the automatic claim of
blood shed violently for vengeance, which was only allayed when covered
with soil. This is well illustrated in Ezek. 24.8, to rouse up wrath to take
vengeance I have set her blood on the bare surface of the rock so that it may
not be covered; cf. Isa. 26.21, and the earth will uncover the blood which is
in it and will not cover any more those who are slain on it. The conception
of blood crying for vengeance from the ground after Cains murder of Abel
(Gen. 4.10f.) is another graphic illustration of that principle. The verbs kissh
(cover) and zaq (cry) here re-echo those passages, and, we believe,
occasioned the corruption of z (my owing blood) to zaaq (my cry)
in v. 18b. The same conception might underlie 31.38a. See below ad loc.
18. al-yeh mqm lezaaq (let there be no place for my cry) raises the
difculty of the interpretation of mqm, which is taken variously as a place
where the cry stops (so G.B. Gray, Hlscher, Horst, Guillaume, Fohrer,
Lvque) or where it is hidden (Dhorme) or stied (Stevenson). Taking
zaaq as a corruption of z (my owing blood), cognate of Arab.
waaa, we should have the required parallel to dm (my blood) with a
more natural association with mqm in its normal sense of place, or as
meaning grave or resting place, as in the Phoenician inscription of Eshmunazar (Cooke 1903: 159ff. ll. 3-4); cf. Ezek. 39.11, where mqm is a
synonym of qeer (grave), cited by Dahood (1962: 61f.). The theme is
resumed in 19.25.
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19. gam-atth introduces a new, and here most signicant proposition, that of
a superhuman witness for Job. bammermm is formally ambiguous, meaning
possibly among the exalted ones, a meaning attested only twice in the OT in
the late passages Isa. 24.4 and Eccl. 10.6, and in the high places, the usual
meaning in the OT, which is supported here by the parallel bemayim. The
Aram. ha, the synonymous parallel of (my witness), is a regular
feature in the language of the Book of Job; cf. aha in Gen. 31.47, where
the Aram. is attested by the form and by the fact that a Heb. equivalent is
given.
20. MT melay ry means either my friends are those who mock me (from
l) or, reading mimmel ry (from the scofng of my friends), which
might possibly connect with v. 20b, if we include el-elah, el-eloah daleh
n (I look to God with wakeful eye). But this breaks the sequence of
thought between vv. 19 and 21, and might be suspected as a secondary
intrusion, which the defective metre might suggest. The function of an intermediary between God and humans in vv. 19 and 21, however, suggests a
mediator, the ml in fact of 33.23f. In this case MT melay ry would
require emendations such as mel r (one who may interpret my cry),
which would better accord with v. 21. If v. 20 is to be retained as part of the
original text, the regularity of the metre might be restored by reading el-elah
(so Pope), reading the verse mel r el-elah lyw daleh n (one who
will interpret my cry to God; to such a one my eye is ever wakeful). LXX,
however, reads May my prayer come unto the Lord, thus supporting the
reading r, which is attested in Mic. 4.9 and Ps. 139.2. This suggested to
Dhorme the reading lem r el-elah (May my cry reach God!) taking
the verb as optative perfect, regular in Arab. and occurring in Ugaritic, introduced by the enclitic le. m, in this sense, as possibly in 11.7, is to be
recognized as cognate of Aram. me. On this view the asseverative enclitic le
and m would have been displaced to give the reading mel (nal y of MT
being a dittograph of in the Old Heb. script), perhaps under the inuence of
33.23f. But ml is well established with the nuance of intercessor in the
Elihu addendum, which was not much later than the main part of the Book of
Job, so that there is nothing strange in the idea being familiar to the author of
the Book. The word signies an interpreter of the language in Gen. 42.33
and in two Phoenician inscriptions (CIS, I, 44, 88), and the object r
indicates that this is the sense of ml if this reading is original in v. 20a. On
the reading we have adopted an extra beat is required in v. 20b. Dhorme
inserts lenyw after dleh, after which he assumes that it has been omitted
by haplography. But we nd Popes suggestion more acceptable, that lyw,
occurring before dleh, was omitted by haplography after el-elah. The
verb dla is problematic. It occurs in Eccl. 10.16 referring to the collapse of a
house, having an Ugaritic cognate. This is evidently the sense of the verb in
Ps. 119.28, dleh na, as suggested by the antithetic parallel qayyemn. In
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Prov. 19.13; 27.15, dele denotes the dripping of rain, which has suggested the
translation of v. 20b as my eye drops (tears); but this rendering breaks the
sequence of thought in the context. The phrase in v. 20b recalls Isa. 38.14f.
from the Plaint of the Sufferer in Hezekiahs lamentation, where the verb is
dlal, possibly a corruption of dla, which would suit the context better,
since the sufferer is orientated to on high, like Job in v. 19, and calls on God
to stand surety for him (oren, Isa. 38.14b; cf. Job 17.3a). A fresh approach
is opened by Fohrer, who adduces Akk. dalpu (to be sleepless) as a possible
cognate of a homonym of Heb. dla in its two known senses, which gives
more meaning in the context of vv. 19 and 20.
21. The sing. weya (that he might argue) would indicate that the witness
and the interpreter were one and the same, and im-elah would seem to
preclude the notion of God as the heavenly witness testifying against himself,
as Dhorme suggests (so G.B. Gray, Fohrer, Lvque). In en-m, w is
probably a corruption of k in the Old Heb. script, as T and V indicate, hence
our reading keen-m lerh. Here we would take ben-m as a human
being and rh not as his friend, but as another; cf. lerh (one to
another), a regular phrase in the Old Testament. We should further stress the
meaning of le, in the interest of, supporting the role of Jobs witness and
interpreter in contention with (im) God in the rle of accuser.
22. Job, as the psalmist cited in the lament of Hezekiah in Isa. 38.14f., alleges
the brevity of his life and the negative prospect of death and decline on the
journey of no return, ra l- (cf. Akk. uruu la taru, cited by
Dhorme). mispr qualifying a noun means few, that is, so few that may be
counted; cf. me mispr (Gen. 34.30; Ps. 105.12; etc.) and Arab. darhimu
maddatu(n), the few dirhams for which Joseph was sold. at (to come) is
the regular Aram. and Arab. verb to come, which is also used in Classical
Heb., though less extensively. In this part of Jobs reply to Eliphaz he signicantly passes from mourning in sackcloth (vv. 15-16) to the condent assertion of his innocence. Indeed, he makes a dramatic appeal for justice in the
gure of the well-known convention of vengeance for blood spilt (v. 18)
which cries for vengeance and the vindication of the victim, like the blood of
innocent Abel shed by Cain (Gen. 4.11). The implication of Jobs appeal could
not be plainer. God must admit justice. The question is: Who should call him
to account?
Orthodox theology, regarding God as nal authority and as the nal cause
of suffering as retribution for sin, could not admit investigation of Jobs case
beyond the temporal experience. But condent of his innocence and of Gods
moral order, Job raises his case to a new dimension in referring it to a heavenly
court, reminiscent of the court in the Prologue, a member of which, unlike the
n, would be a natural upholder of the Order of the Divine Sovereign. Such
a one might testify on his behalf and present his case intelligibly and
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256
sympathetically to God. Job further invites, one might almost say challenges,
God to assume a pledge or guarantee for him (17.3). This declaration signies
Jobs absolute condence in his innocence and in the ultimate recognition of it
by God, who would not be asked, nor would he be expected, to risk his credit
by going bail in a dubious case. It is at once a daring challenge by Job and an
expression of his condence in Gods justice. If we were disposed, like
Dhorme and others, to see in Jobs appeal to God to confront Himself in the
sufferers interest, we might admit the proposition to the extent that it is an
appeal in condence to the living God to vindicate His nature and economy
against what orthodox theology in its inherent limitation had systematized.
Chapter 17
Jobs Rejoinder to Eliphaz (continued)
Jobs lamentation for his suffering (7, 11f.) permitted, if not actually inicted,
by God (6) and his hopeless prospect of a short remaining life and the oblivion
of death (12-16) is the theme of this chapter. The gloom, however, is relieved
by Jobs reference of his case to God in calling on him to undertake the
responsibility of bail in complete condence of his innocence.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
My spirit is broken!
My days are extinguished!
Only burial for me!
Surely I am the butt of mockers,1
And my eye is weary2 with their contention.
Lay down a pledge3 for me,
(For) who will take it upon himself to give surety for me?
Since you have closed their minds to understanding,
You will not let them prevail.4
One who makes a lavish party5 for others
While his own children faint.
But you have set me up6 as a byword7 to the peoples.
One in whose face men spit;
And my eye has grown dim through vexation,
And my limbs are spent8 like a shadow.
9The
righteous are shocked by this,

And the innocent is indignant at the impious.
But let the righteous man hold to his way
And the pure of hands will gain strength.
But come on again, all of you,10
I shall not nd a wise man among you.9
My days have passed away without (the realization of) my plans,11
My hearts desires12 are torn away;
Night is appointed13 for a day,
And light14 is near to darkness.
The Book of Job

13.
Surely I have no hope! Sheol is my home!

I spread15 my bed in darkness.
14.
I call the Pit my father,

Worms my mother and sister.
Where then is my hope,
And as for my piety, who will observe it?
Will they go down to Sheol with me?16
Shall we all together go down17 to the dust?
15.
16.
257

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
Reading helm for the hapax legomenon halm as the personal antecedent to the
pronominal sufx in hamrtm (see also Commentary).
Reading tilenn (energic form of the imperfect), assuming corruption of to y in
the Old Heb. script.
Reading erbn with S and T for MT orebn.
Reading termemm or termm for MT termm.
Conjecturing y for MT yagg. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading wattain for MT wehiian.
Reading limeal with LXX, Aq., Theod., T, Sym., and V for MT limel.
Reading kl for MT kullm, assuming corruption of w to m in the Old Hebrew
script.
Probably a secondary expansion. See Introduction to Chapters 1617.
Reading wekulleem with S, V and certain Heb. MSS for MT kullm and omitting
welm as a dittograph before kullam.
Reading mizzimay for MT zimmay, prepositional m (privative) being omitted by
haplography after w in the Old Hebrew script.
Reading maare for MT mr. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading hm for MT ym, reading nal w of ym with the following word, y
being a corruption of h in the Old Heb. script.
Reading wer for MT r. See textual note 13.
Reading raat or ribbat for MT rippat.
Reading bey (perhaps spelt be, as in Phoenician inscriptions) as suggested by
LXX (haimm), for MT badd.
Reading na as suggested by Sh for MT nhat.
1. Proposed emendations of MT ymay and niz are designed to secure a
3:3 rhythm, for example r hubblh imm neeze qerm l (My spirit
is destroyed within me, the grave remains for me; so Fohrer after Duhm). For
this meaning of za, Duhm cited Isa. 18.6, where, however the sense is
abandoned. If those proposals were accepted we should prefer the sense
prepared, taking the verb as cognate with Ugaritic db. In Jobs anguish,
however, the 2:2:2 metre is not unapt, and we nd no reason to emend MT.
al is cognate with Ass. ablu, Aram. and Syr. abbl and Arab. abala
(to ruin, destroy). zaa, a hapax legomenon in the OT, is possibly a byform
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258
of the more familiar da (to be extinguished), which would be quite

appropriate to my day, sc. daylight. The plural qerm may be abstract
burial or a case of pluralis excellentiae for emphasis.
2. im here, as in 30.25 and 31.36, may be interrogative, but, with the negative,
we prefer to take it as the introduction to a strong asseverative with ellipse of
an oath. After the ancient versions, later commentators have taken haulm as
an abstract plural (mockery) from the known verbal root hal, and have
emended MT hammerm to tamrrm (bitterness); so Duhm and Dhorme
after V and S. We would read the participle helm as antecedent to the
pronominal sufx in hamrm (for MT hammerm), the Hiphil innitive
construct of a root mrh cognate with Syr. mr and Arab. mara(y) (to dispute).
Here we may note Dahoods ingenious suggestion that the couplet reects Canaanite
mythology, where Baal sends his emissaries to Mt (Death) in his city Hmry (Ruin),
on the way to which they come to the two mounts which hem in the earth (im tlm
r ar), on the basis of which Dahood suggests the reading of Job 17.2:
im l hattillayim immd ahamrayim tln n
Surely the twin mounts are before me, and in the two miry depths my eyes will
sleep.
While this would amplify v. 1c, it does not accord with the sequel, with the reference
to the third parties in v. 4, which demands an antecedent, which we would nd in
helm.
3. imh requires an object, which suggests the emendation of MT oren to the
noun erbn (my pledge, i.e. a pledge for me). Dhorme regards the pledge as
given by Job, consisting of his sufferings. But the pledge was given by another, a
guarantor that one under disability would not default, hence, as there is no other who
may strike hands with Job, that is, go bail for hire (cf. Prov. 6.1; 17.18; 22.26), God
is appealed to deposit a pledge with himself. Horst avoids, or evades, the difculty
of God entering a pledge with himself by taking mh, as is possible, as set or
x, but the reexive yittqa in the parallel colon (take upon himself to strike
hands) indicates that it is God himself who is asked to go bail as in Hezekiahs
prayer (Isa. 38.14).
4. an, as well as meaning to hide, means to take into storage, that is,
into safe keeping, hence the sense here to close up, the preposition in
miel being privative.
5. We propose that MT leq here is a cognate of Arab. alqu(n) (circle), so
a party (cf. Arab. alaqa in the II form (to meet round a table) and that
yagg is a corruption of an original ya cognate with Arab. jda, yajdu
(to be excellent) (cf. jaudu[n], generosity, and the verb in the V form, to
vie in generosity). The couplet is probably a popular proverb meaning
1
The Book of Job
259
Charity begins at home. Fohrer takes it to apply to God, whose benecence,

frequently instanced in Hymns of Praise, contrasts with his treatment of Job.
But in view of Jobs animadversions on the alienation of his friends (v. 2) we
regard the proverb as referring to the prodigality of their admonitions and
perhaps the lavish scattering of their pearls of wisdom and their disproportionate sympathy for their worthy friend in his spiritual need. We would take
rm, without the pronominal sufx, not as friends but as others, in
contrast to bnyw in v. 5b (cf. 16.21 and the phrase lerh, one among
others). For the wasting of the eyes, that is, fainting, cf. 11.20; Lam. 2.11;
4.17; Ps. 69.4 (EVV 3).
6. hi, from ya, is used of setting up rmly and deliberately, for
example, a cult-object on its base, like Gideons ephod at Ophrah (Judg. 8.27),
or the Ark in the temple of Dagan (1 Sam. 5.2) and at Jerusalem (2 Sam. 6.17).
Thus it is aptly used of setting up as an example (ml) or warning. The
phrase limeal ammm recalls wehyleml leol hammm in the
context of indelity to the Covenant obligations in Deut. 28.37; cf. Ps. 44.15
(EVV 14). For MT te lenm V reads lienhem and Perles proposed to read
m (a portent) (so Beer, Budde, Klostermann, Ball, Stevenson). But MT
may be retained and translated one in whose face men spit (so Gray,
Hlscher, Horst, Lvque, Fohrer); cf. 30.9, where spitting is expressed by rq,
as in Isa. 50.6. te, found only here in the OT, is derived from t (to spit).
7. kh (to be dim, extinguished) is used of the eyes in Gen. 27.1 and 1
Sam. 3.2 and of the wick of a lamp in Isa. 42.3. Vexation (kaas) is said to
impair the sight, as after weeping, in Ps. 6.8 (EVV 7). yeurm (lit. the things
that are fashioned) is taken by Rashi after T to mean limbs which are spent
(kl for MT kullm); so Houbigant, Reiske, Ehrlich, Duhm, Hlscher, Fohrer.
Like a shadow may denote either emaciation or rapid failing like a passing
shadow.
9-10. Possibly a secondary expansion. See Introduction to Chapters 1617.
8. yirr (pausal) means grows excited, here in indignation. Indignation
(hihrh) against the wicked, ourishing with apparent impunity, is the theme
of Ps. 37.1, 7, 8. On n, see above on 8.15.
10. Omitting lm metri causa, we of itself in the context having adversative
force.
In view of the second person plur. of the verbs, kulleem should probably
with read with some Heb. MSS, S and V (so Dhorme, G.B. Gray and others).
11. zimmh, from zmam, means plan, device, usually in a sinister sense, but
it is also used of Gods gracious purpose for Jerusalem in Zech. 8.15 and in a
1
260
neutral sense in Prov. 2.11; 3.21; 5.2. maare (wish, desire), which we read
for MT mr (see Textual Note), supplies the parallel to zimmh. It is known
in the form aree in Ps. 21.3, and in the verbal form in Ugartic ar and Akk.
ereu.
12. If MT ym, with the subject indenite, is read in its usual sense they
make (night day), the verse would contradict the general sense of the passage.
The versions give no help, nor are the interpretations of later commentators
unanimous or convincing. Hence we suggest the reading:
layelh leym hm
wer qr minn-e
Night is appointed for day,
And light is near to darkness.
The verse now agrees with the context.

13. On the emendation ribbat, lit. I have laid down the blankets
(marbaddm) for MT rippat see Textual Note. The perfect here and in v. 14
may be understood as a declaratory perfect. The making of ones bed in Sheol
recalls Ps. 139.8, where the verb is ya (cf. yea bed).
14. The personication of the Pit (haaa) as my father and Corruption
or the worm (rimmh) as my sister recalls the personication of Wisdom as
my sister in Prov. 7.4 and is an old literary gure in Canaanite poetry, as for
example the Ras Shamra Legend of Krt, Gordon UT 127.35f.: km at r mdw
ant r zbln (Sickness is thy bedfellow, inrmity thy concubine).
15. The apparent repetition of tiqw in the couplet is almost inconceivable in
a work with the range of vocabulary of Job, hence the second incidence of the
word has been emended to tb (my prosperity) after LXX by Merx,
Bickell, Siegfried, Duhm, Hlscher, Stevenson, Horst). Guillaume (Promise
and Fullment, ed. F.F. Bruce, 1963, p. 113) proposed to see in the second
tiqw Arab. taqway (piety, fear of God), reecting his view of the
provenance of the Book of Job in the Hejaz. See Introduction, pp. 35-36.
16. MT badd (bars, cf. 18.3; 41.4, lit. limbs; cf. the staves on which the
ark was carried, Exod. 25.13, 14, 15 etc.) is doubtful. LXX renders the colon
or with me will they go down?, which may suggest haey (so Dhorme,
citing Ass. ina idi, lit. by my hand, i.e. beside me). This is supported by the
parallel yaa. MT, pointed in scriptio defectiva b, as regularly in Phoenician inscriptions, may be preferred. na must be pointed na (shall we
descend?); so LXX, as the parallel tran indicates. The verb is Aram. nea,
but has a Ugaritic cognate.
1
Job 18
THE REPLY OF BILDAD
Like Eliphaz, Bildad abandons the attempt to bring Job to confess sin and seek
Gods grace. In an introductory strophe (18.2-4) he upbraids Job for presuming that he was wiser than his friends and for adducing his case to call the
theodicy in question. From this point he goes on in six strophes of three bicola
each, except the last, which is of two bicola (18.5-7, 8-10, 11-13, 14-16, 1719, 20-21), to assert the theodicy in stating the fate of the wicked, whose sin
brings its own nemesis, in a series of vivid gures.
The literary afnity of the opening strophe is with the contention at law and
the sapiential controversy, and that of the sequel is the sapiential discourse or
the subject of sin and retribution. The statement begins with what is probably
the citation of a proverb, the light of the wicked is put out (cf. Prov. 13.9,
with lamp for light), which is cited again in 21.17, to be exploded by Job.
The theme is then sustained in gures familiar in the assertion of faith in
providence or the imprecation of the sufferer in poems of the type of the Plaint
of the Sufferer, many of which reect the empiric observations of the sage.
1.
And Bildad the Shuhite answered and said:
2.
How long until you stop speaking?1

Consider2 and we3 shall speak.
Why are we considered as beasts,
Accounted dull4 in your sight?
You, who are one who rends himself in his anger,
Shall the earth be foresaken for your sake,
And the rock be shifted from its place?
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
1
Yea, the light of the wicked5 is quenched,

And the ame of his re does not shine.
The light in his tent is darkened,
And his lamp above him goes out.
His mighty strides are restricted,6
And his own plan makes him stumble.7
For he goes unrestrained into the net with his own feet
And he walks on to the hurdle;
The trap catches hold of his heel,
The noose closes tight on him;
262
Job 18. The Reply of Bildad
10.
The snare for him is hidden in the ground,

Yea, his trap on the path.
11.
All around terrors overwhelm him

And they surround8 him right to his feet.
His strength will become cowardice,
With disaster ready by his side.
9His skin is eaten away by disease,9
The rst-born of Death devours his limbs.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
He is torn from his secure tent10

And marched11 before the king of terrors;
Flame12 settles on his tent,
13
Brimstone is scattered13 on his homestead.
His roots dry up below
And his branch withers above.
His memory perishes from the earth,
And he has no name abroad.
He is thrust out from the light into darkness;
He is chased from the world,
Without kith and kin among his own people,
And without survival where he has lived in asylum.
At his fate folk of the West are appalled,
And folk in the East are seized14 with horror.
Surely these are the dwellings of the wrong-doer,
And this is the place of the man who would not acknowledge God.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
Reading sing. temenn (energic) for MT temn and q for MT qin after
11QtargJob and LXX, and taking y of qin as a corruption of in the Old Heb.
script and reading el-milln for MT lemilln.
Reading the singular tenenn (energic) for MT tn.
Reading anan for MT aar after LXX.
Reading neammn for MT nimn.
Reading r for MT rem, agreeing with the sing. pronom. sufx in v. 5b.
Reading yr for MT yer.
Reading wealh with LXX for MT wetalh.
Reading wehiqquh for MT weheuh.
Reading yl bieway r for MT yl badd r.
Reading m hel mita for MT mohol mita.
Reading weyaih for MT weaih.
Reading mabbl for MT mibbel (l yezreh).
Reading lzrah (Pual with enclitic le introducing imperfect) for MT l yezreh. See
Commentary ad loc.
Reading az for MT az, nal w being a dittograph after z in the last development of the Heb. script. Alternatively the passive uaz may be read, taking ar
(MT ar) adverbially, as proposed by Dahood (1962: 63).
The Book of Job
263
2. In view of Bildads address to Job in vv. 4ff., the singular of the verbs in vv.
2f. should be read, with energic ending and corruption of nal w of the verbs
from energic n. On our proposed reading, temenn q l-milln, based on
11QtargJob and LXX, see above, p. 80.
3. An original benek was probably corrupted to MT beenkem after the
corruption of the verbs in v. 2 to the plural following the failure to recognize
the energic ending of the imperfect sing. On the corruption of an original
neammn (we are dull) from mam with a Syr. cognate, see above, p. 81.
4. Bildad, having accused Job of treating his interlocutors as brute beasts,
accuses Job of intensifying his sufferings by agonizing over the moral problem
and scorning the comfort of orthodoxy, thus preying upon himself. He also
animadverts on Jobs accusation of God as rending him like a wild beast
(16.9). In v. 4a Bildad objects that Jobs claim to exception from the consequences of sin that he and his friends had accepted as the moral order of
suffering is tantamount to his questioning Gods Order in Creation (cf. Pss.
90.2; 93.2). In the sequel he cites instances of the moral order he assumes,
while pressing his indictment of Job. r na beapp, though the participle is in the vocative and the two following nouns are with the 3rd sing.
pronom. sufx, is no problem, since the reference is to a category; cf. 2 Kgs
9.31, cited by G.B. Gray (zimr hr anyw, Thou Zimri who slew his
master).
5. e (ame), attested in MT only here and in the Aram. part of Dan. (3.22;
7.9), is found in Ben Sira 8.10; 45.19. It is not to be taken forthwith as an
Aramaism, being possibly attested in Ugaritic as bb in Gordon UT nt III.43.
The statement of the light of the wicked being quenched (vv. 5f.) possibly
cites a regular proverb, and is explicitly contradicted by Job in 21.17.
7. MT yer should be emended to yr from rar, a stative verb meaning
to be restricted. n is parallel to ka (strength) at 40.16. The restriction of
the strong footsteps is characteristic of age or weakness; the length of the steps
expresses strength, condence and prosperity; see, for example, Ps. 18.37
(EVV 36): You lengthen (tar) my steps (aaay) under me, and my ankles
do not totter, and cf. in the Mesopotamian myth of Atraasis, their long legs
have become quite short (Labat 1970: 133). On the reading wealhu, see
Textual Note. In a and in beralyw (v. 8a) we suggest that the pronominal sufxes should be emphasized: his own counsel and with his own feet.
8. The passive (Pual) ulla is found again in Judg. 5.15, where the emphasis
is on free and spontaneous, and indeed, impetuous movement; cf. Prov. 29.15,
1
264
naar meull m imm (an unrestrained boy brings shame to his

mother). The gure of the wicked caught in a trap probably reects the theme
of the wicked caught in his own trap in the Plaint of the Sufferer in Pss. 9.11;
35.7; 140.6 (EVV 5). eh means lattice-work, such as is on the top of the
pillars Yakin and Boaz in the Temple (1 Kgs 7.17ff.) and in the window of a
palace (2 Kgs 1.2). The conception of walking on lattice-work is found again
in Ben Sira, where the word is ree (usually a net). What is envisaged is
obviously a light hurdle concealed by grass and earth covering a pit.
9. pa is a spring trap such as closes up and takes hold (yz) of its victim,
like that which springs up from the ground and grips (la) its victim (Isa.
24.18; Jer. 48.44; Eccl. 7.26). ammm, derived from mam, cognate either
with Arab. amma (to draw tight) or with Arab. amma (to enwrap, as with
a bandage) probably denotes the noose of a snare.
10. al (his line), if it does not denote a snare, may mean a rope stretched
over a path to trip the unwary; cf. Ps. 140.6 (EVV 5), which refers to alm.
malut, derived from la (cf. Amos 3.5), is indeterminate. The various
kinds of trap, ree, pa and eel are mentioned in the Plaint of the Sufferer
in Ps. 140.6.
11. MT weheh (and they scatter him) is suspect. Ezekiel 34.21, cited by
Dhorme in support of MT, is doubtful evidence. G.R. Driver (1953b: 256ff.)
proposes that the verb is cognate of Arab. fa, which in the IV form means
to micturate, hence the consequence of extreme fear, which would suit the
context. But in view of s in v. 11a, wehiqquh seems a more likely
reading, assuming the scribal error of metathesis of p and q with corruption of
q to in the Old Heb. script.
12. MT r in its usual sense of hungry has been accepted by most
commentators (so Duhm, Dhorme, Szczygiel, Ball, Kissane, Pope, Fohrer),
though there has been difference of opinion as to the precise meaning of the
colon. The matter is complicated by the meaning n in the context, which in
Heb. means variously strength (Job 18.7; cf. Gen. 49.3; Deut. 21.17; Isa.
40.26; Hos. 12.4; Ps. 105.36; Job 40.16) and wealth (Job 20.16; Hos. 12.9).
Thus r must have some natural relation to n, probably in the sense of
strength. G.R. Driver (1953b: 259f.) suggests that the verb (here a participle)
is cognate of Arab. raiba (to fear, be cowardly), which does suit the context,
especially v. 11a, which mentions the terrors which overwhelm the sinner.
Dhorme takes leal (lit. to his rib, side) to mean by his side, citing the
Ass. use of lu with the same force, but taking nn as standing up. We
prefer the translation disaster () is ready by his side; cf. nn in this
sense in 12.5 expressing the imminence of disaster.
1
The Book of Job
265
13. The apparent repetition of badd/baddyw in MT is suspect, as usual in

such cases. Wright, Budde, G.B. Gray, Tur-Sinai, Dhorme, Perles, Kissane,
Hlscher, Fohrer and Pope read yl bieway r (his skin, sc. body, is
eaten away by disease). Stevensons objection that deway (disease) is doubtful is hypercritical in view of the phrase ere deway in Ps. 41.4 (EVV 3) and the
occurrence of deway with this meaning in 6.7 and the incidence in Aram., Syr.
and Arab., cf. mdw in Ugaritic. Skin (r) here, as parallel to baddw (his
limbs), if it does not mean simply body, may denote the skin as the part of
the body where the disease makes its rst visible ravages. Death is personied
on the precedent of the highly anthropomorphic Canaanite mythology in the
Ras Shamra texts. On the rst-born of Death (ber mwe), Dhorme aptly
cites the Mesopotamian conception that the plague-god Namtaru is termed the
Grand Vizier of the Queen of the Underworld, an ofce which is also
expressed in the idiom of Mesopotamian mythology by the designation of this
gure as the rst-born, as Mummu was the rst-born of Apsu (the Lower
Deep) in the myth of the conquest of Chaos by Cosmos in the Babylonian New
Year festival. For the Heb. usage of rst-born to express conspicuous or
foremost, cf. Isa. 14.30, the rst-born of the poor, that is, the poorest, and
Exod. 4.22, Israel as the rst-born among the nations, that is, the foremost.
14. naq (to tear away) is already attested at 15.11 and Jer. 6.20, and at
Josh. 8.16, where it means withdraw.
15. In MT tikn beohol mibbel-l, tikn requires a suitable subject. Just
possible, but, we think, unlikely, is mibbel-l, none of what belongs to him,
taking min as partitive. A noun feasibly suggested is the feminine ll, the
Night-hag, read by Voigt, Beer, Ball, Houtsma and Fohrer. Those suggestions,
however, ignore the parallelism demanded by the reference to sulphur (gor)
in v. 15b. Dhorme has suggested that sulphur may be used as a disinfectant or
in a rite of separation, sc. from previous ownership or occupation, in which
case the former suggestion is of itself just possible. But sulphur was also a
means of destruction, as in the case of Sodom and Gomorrah, where it is associated with re. Thus in v. 15a mibbel may be a corruption of re. Here
Dahood (1957: 312ff.) happily adduces the Ugaritic noun nbl (ame); cf.
Akk. nablu, as the original of which mibbel is the corruption. Thus he proposes to read mabbl and to take MT l as the corruption of emphatic enclitic le
before the imperfect as in Ugaritic and Arab., thus restoring the couplet as:
tikn heoholh mabbl lzrh al-nwh gor
Flame settles on his tent, brimstone is scattered on his homestead.
nweh is the abode of shepherds (Jer. 33.12), and is used of a house (Prov.
3.33) and even of the city of Jerusalem (Isa. 27.10; Ps. 79.7) and of the
Temple (Exod. 15.13). In 5.24, as in the present passage, it is parallel to hel,
with its original pastoral nuance.
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16. Here the fate of the wicked is described again in the gure of the tree, with
its roots drying up and its branches wilting; cf. 15.30.
17. zir means mention of him or his reputation, which preserves a man in
some semblance of existence even after death according to popular belief in
ancient Israel. m (lit. name) indicates also reputation and also a mans
actual name, which is perpetuated in his sons. (outside) is found in plural
parallelism with ere in 5.10 as here. Dhorme assumes that it means desert
in contrast to the cultivated and inhabited land ere. This may be so in Prov.
8.26 and Ps. 144.13; cf. the Aram. rendering bar, which means both outside
and, as in the Arab. cognate, desert, but in Job the two terms may be synonymous.
18. In yehdeuh (they thrust him out) and yenidduh, from na (to ee),
the 3rd plur. expresses the indenite subject, which is tantamount to the
passive of the sing. na found in the Hophal in 20.8.
19. nn and ne are used together in Gen. 21.23, Isa. 14.22 and Ben Sira
47.22 to denote a comprehensive number of ones people. nn is not attested
except here and in the passages cited. It may be connected with a verb nn,
which is possibly, but doubtfully, attested at Ps. 72.17. Since ne is not
attested beyond these passages its derivation and precise signicance are
uncertain. The meaning may be rendered with similar alliteration in English
kith and kin. r means survivor of a great danger or calamity (cf. 20.21;
27.15). Note the contrast between amm (his own people), basically kinsmen, who derived their origin, like an Arab tribe, from a common ancestor
amm, and meryw, to the place where he lives only as a sojourner or
protected alien (gr).
20. ym in the sense of the day of his destiny is attested in 1 Sam. 26.10
(im) ym y wm ([if] his day come that he die). Here, therefore, it
signies his fate. The antithetic parallelism of the folk of the West
(aarnm) and the folk of the East (qamnm) to give a comprehensive
picture recalls the passage in the Ugaritic Baal myth (Gordon UT nt II.7-8)
where the goddess
Smites the princes by the sea-shore (sc. West),
Annihilates the folk in the direction of the sunrise.
aar (horror) is attested in the reduplicated forms in Jer. 5.30; 18.13 and
Hos. 6.10. See Textual Note.
21. ya-l is not limited to knowledge about God, but here denotes
knowledge of God involving personal reaction to Him, acknowledgment rather
than knowledge.
1
Job 19
JOBS REJOINDER TO BILDAD
This speech is constructed of eight strophes (19.2-4, 5-8, 9-12, 13-16, 17-20,
21-24, 25-27, 28-29), each of three or four bicola, except the last, which
consists of a bicolon and a tricolon. It is introduced by the rst strophe (vv. 24) in the convention of a legal controversy. In the address proper, Job complains in the rst two strophes (vv. 5-8, 9-12) in the convention of a plea at
law, holding that God wronged him (esp. v. 6), and he elaborates on his
sufferings at the hand of God in the hyperbolic and gurative language of the
Plaint of the Sufferer, where the sufferer describes the alienation of his friends
and associates who see his sufferings as a token of his sin and alienation from
God. This serves Job to describe his own sufferings and to animadvert on the
popular view of suffering as the consequence of sin as evidenced in the
reaction of his friends. In the highly individualistic character of the Book of
Job, it is not possible to limit the passages strictly to one literary type or
another. Thus there is often a mixture of the characteristic motifs, phraseology
and gures of the Plaint of the Sufferer and the legal controversy, while the
conventional language and sequence of ideas in the legal controversy are often
used in sapiential dispute. Thus the sixth strophe (vv. 21-24) opens with a plea
for mercy in a legal context (vv. 21-22) and continues with the wish that the
evidence for the accused were recorded for future reference, and in the seventh
strophe (vv. 25-27) Job resumes the theme of his ultimate appeal before God,
supported by a celestial witness and interpreter and possibly advocate, before
his death (cf. 16.18-22). Now he declares his conviction (yat, v. 25) that he
will live to see his vindication (vv. 25f.) despite his physical extremity (v. 26)
and, the nal contingency, before God himself (v. 26).
Chapter 19
1.
2.
How long will you torment me

And crush me with words?
These ten times now you approach me,
You are not ashamed to seem shocked at me.
And if indeed I have gone astray,
My error remains my own.
3.
4.
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268
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
Job 19. Jobs Rejoinder to Bildad

Would you indeed assume superiority to me,
And make reproach of me an argument?
Then know that it is God who has wronged me,
And cast his net about me.
If I cry out Violence! I am not answered,
If I cry for help there is no justice.
He has walled up my path and I may not pass,
He has set thorns on my path.
He has stripped me of my prestige,
And has taken away the crown from my head.
He breaks me down utterly and I am gone,
And he has uprooted my hope like a tree;
And he has kindled His anger against me,
And has counted me as His enemy.1
His troops come massed against me,
Yea, they raise up2 their ramp against me,
They camp3 around my tent.
My brothers have held aloof,4
My acquaintances are mere strangers to me;
My kinsmen and close friends have failed me.
The sojourners in my house have forgotten me,
Yea, my slave-girls treat me as an outsider,
I am a stranger in their eyes.
I have called to my slave and he does not answer me,
I have to entreat him with my own mouth.
My breath is repugnant to my wife,
And I am putrid to my own children.
Even children spurn me,
If I rise they turn their back on me.
All my intimates abhor me,
And those whom I loved have turned against me.
5
My bones cleave to my skin,5
And I have escaped on the forfeiture of my esh.6
But you, my friends, pity me, pity me,
For it is the hand of God that has touched me!
Why do you pursue me like God,
Never sated with my esh?
Would that my words were written down,
Would that they were engraved in an inscription7
With an iron pen and leaded,
Were inscribed on the rock forever.
But I myself am sure: the One who will vindicate me is vital,
And the One who is the nal authority will prove himself effective on this
earth,
8And though my skin is stripped from my esh
Even after that I shall come face to face with God,
The Book of Job

27.
Whom I myself shall see,

Whom I shall see with my own eyes,9 himself and no stranger.
My reins grow faint within me
28.
If you say How shall we prosecute him,

And nd in him a pretext for a case?,
Fear the sword for yourselves,
For excessive zeal in wrong courses spells ruin.10
That you may know that there is a judge.11
29.
269

Reading r with LXX, S and T for MT ryw.
Reading weysll for MT wayysll.
Reading weyaan for MT wayyaan.
Reading hirq with LXX, Aq, Sym and S and one Heb. MS for MT hirq, which is
supported by 11QtargJob.
5. Reading ber deqh am, omitting ier in v. 20a. See n. 6.
6. Reading ber for MT inny, assuming displacement from 20a. See Commentary
ad loc.
7. Reading beser for MT basser.
8. Reading wer niqqe mibber // weaar z eezeh elah. See Commentary
ad loc.
9. Reading nay rh for MT nay r. See Commentary ad loc.
10. Reading re for MT ere.
11. Reading eyy dayyn for MT addn.
1.
2.
3.
4.
2. tyn is the Hiphil imperfect retaining the original nal y of yh,
cognate of Arab. wajiya (to have a pain). It occurs in rather late passages in
the OT, the earliest being Zeph. 3.18, where the text is doubtful. Otherwise the
incidences are postexilic, for example, Lam. 1.4, 5, 12; 3.32, 35 and Isa. 51.23.
LXX read tn (do you weary?), but MT better suits the parallelism. Here
nee with the pronominal sufx has the force of the personal pronoun.
3. tahker is a hapax legomenon on which T and the early Jewish commentators show no unanimity. The verb may be a cognate of Arab. hakara (to be
astonished). On this assumption we would see a reference to Jobs annoyance
at his friends affected astonishment at his protestation of innocence in the
face of the conventional inference of sin from suffering. This describes the
reaction of outraged orthodoxy to Jobs embarrassing questions. Ten times
means simply repeatedly.
4. As appreciated by S, wea-omnm means and if indeed, the protasis of
a conditional sentence without the conditional particle (GKC, 159b, h).
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270
meh means not deliberate or heinous sin, but rather error or sin of
inadvertency (cf. Lev. 4.10; Num. 15.22) or ignorance (Ezek. 20.25); cf. Jobs
admission of juvenile delinquency (13.26).
5. If, as Dhorme maintains, im-omnm introduces a question expressing
indignant astonishment, it is nevertheless tantamount to the protasis of a conditional sentence. This is supported by the enclitic with the imperative
de in v. 6a; cf. Arab. fa, which introduces the apodosis when the verb is
imperative. tadl (lit. probably affect greatness) expresses the sense of
moral superiority of the self-righteous in face of the suffering of Job believed
to be retributory, an attitude which is described in similar language in Pss.
35.17 (EVV 16) and 55.13 (EVV 12).
6. me denotes a hunting implement, from the verb (to hunt), which
we may conjecture from the preposition al to be a net. The noun is found
complementary to erem (net) in Eccl. 7.26 and of a net for sh in Eccl.
9.12. From this point Job desists from his address to his friends and pointedly
ascribes his afictions to the inveterate enmity of God in striking gures and
tone familiar in the fast-liturgy in Lam. 3.1-18.
8. The parallel with he has walled up my way (or gar)cf. Lam. 3.8
leads us to question the meaning darkness for e in v. 8b, and supports
Guillaumes suggestion (1963: 114) that the word, perhaps differently pointed
as , is cognate with Arab. aaku(n) (thorns), which are used for an
obstruction to cattle.
9. ke, here, especially in parallelism with aere (crown), might be
rendered glory, though understood guratively. This, however, is a secondary development of the primary sense weight, substance, hence honour,
the opposite of qellh (lightness), the result of the curse, or of rq (emptiness) of natural signicance. Again, this may be the gure and motif of the
Plaint of the Sufferer; cf. Lam. 5.16, Fallen is the crown of our head. The
conception of humanity as the acme of Gods creation, crowned with glory
and honour (Ps. 8.6 [EVV 5]), is suggested here, but the language may derive
generally from the Plaint of the Sufferer, and perhaps specically from the
liturgy of the fast relating to the king as the representative of the community.
10. Note the use of hla (to pass away, be gone); cf. 14.20. The gure of a
building ruined, if this is indeed the meaning of yitten, as it normally would
be in Heb., is not quite what is expected with a personal object, though it is not
unintelligible (e.g. Ps. 52.7 [EVV 6]), and the military gure of the assault of a
person as the breach of a besieged city. Here, as in 10.8 and 18.11, s tips
the adverbial sense of utterly. nsa is used for the transplanting (after
uprooting) of a vine in Ps. 80.9 (EVV 8).
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271
11. For wayyaar lay app S and V read and His anger was kindled
(wayyiar app), which is a familiar Heb. expression. Here, however, the
Hiphil may be retained with respect to God who is not swayed by passion, but
deliberately rouses his anger. In view of LXX, S and T, his enemy (r) may
be read for MT ryw (his enemies).
12. If MT wey is read, weysll must be read for MT wayysllu. The
military metaphor of preparing a ramp or siege-mound for a battering-ram and
camping round the besieged city recalls the gures in 15.25f. and 16.14; cf.
Gods bands (geyw) in 25.3. The siege-ramp (slelh) (cf. 2 Sam. 20.15;
2 Kgs 19.32 = Isa. 37.33; Jer. 6.6; Ezek. 4.2; 26.8; etc.) is well illustrated in
the siege of Lachish in the reliefs from Sennacheribs palace at Nineveh
(ANEP, pls. 372, 373). My tent is hardly congruous with the gure of a siege
with ramps (v. 12b), and may cast doubts on the originality of v. 12c. But the
tricolon may mark the end of the strophe as occasionally in the poems from
Ras Shamra. In this case hel may mean simply seat, reecting, as not
infrequently in Heb., the desert origin of the Semitic penetration of the settled
land, for example to your tents, O Israel.
13. The versions support the reading of MT a-zr (they have simply been
strangers) as against the arrangement of the consonants in LXX, azr (they
have been cruel), which is attested as a verb in Aram. and as an adjective
azr in Heb. (cf. 30.21; 41.2; Deut. 32.23). But mimmen (from me) militates against this reading. The verb as in MT must denote conduct unnatural to
brothers, relatives and friends; hence zru is a denominative verb to behave as
strangers. This interpretation is supported by v. 15.
14-15. The text should be arranged: el qery meyudday en
gr b (My kinsmen and close friends have failed me, the sojourners in my
house have forgotten me). The sojourner (gr) was one who had been
admitted to the protection of the god of the community and to its social conventions. Such a person might be a travelling merchant, or one of those who
came for seasonal grazing to a locality, a person staying abroad in a time of
local famine or drought, for example, Naomi and her family in the plains of
Moab (Ruth 1.1), or a refugee from blood-revenge who had been given the
right of sanctuary and whom his hosts, for purposes of pride or policy, cared to
maintain beyond a conventional limited period. Such a person among the Arab
tribes, where there are many such, is called jru llhi (protected alien of
God). Their rights in the community of Israel were recognized, but they were
exempted from the strict ritual taboo that applied to Israel (e.g. in food, Deut.
14.21), and, as recognizing the God of Israel and enjoying his protection, they
were admitted to the Passover provided they were circumcised (Exod. 12.48).
Such alienation of a sufferers friends and even relatives on the assumption
that he lay under the Divine wrath is well known in the Plaint of the Sufferer,
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272
either in fact or gure, for example, in Pss. 27.10; 31; 31.12 (EVV 11); 38.12
(EVV 11); 88.9 (EVV 8); etc. The nadir of the sufferers afiction is the
revulsion or contempt of his slaves and young people (vv. 15f.).
17. zrh is taken by Dhorme as derived from zr (to be strange), but he
adduces also zr (to be repugnant), citing Haupt for this specic meaning of
the Ass. zru, of a wife feeling revulsion for her husband. r (my smell)
would be as apt as MT r (my breath). The MT pointing of weann indicates nan, which is known in the Hithpael meaning to entreat, and is taken
to mean this in the versions and most commentaries. But the Qal of this verb is
not certainly attested, and in the context is certainly a homonym, with a Syr.
cognate ann (putrid). Commentators have not failed to notice that Jobs
children according to the Prologue had all perished, and have explained sons
of my belly as uterine brothers, which is unlikely after the reference to
brothers in v. 13 and in parallelism with wife in v. 17. Others again (e.g.
Wetzstein and W.R. Smith) take ban as my clan (cf. Arab. banu[n]), but
this is open to the same objection. The writer is simply using the language and
imagery of the Plaint of the Sufferer to express the extremity of Jobs
miserytotal excommunicationwithout any literal application.
18. The contempt of the young boys (awlm, derived from l, to suck, Gen.
33.13; 1 Sam. 6.7, 19; Isa. 40.11; Ps. 78.71) contrasts with the respect of the
young and even the old in the presence of Job in public before his disaster
(29.8). qmh is the case of the cohortative introducing the protasis in a
conditional sentence, without the conditional particle. The parallelism
indicates that dibbr is a denominative verb to turn the back (so Eitan 1924:
33; G.R. Driver 1934: 55f.).
19. me s, men who share my counsel, that is, intimates; cf. 15.8. zeh is
the relative particle (GKC, 138h), d in Aram. and Ugaritic and related to
Arab. (see above on 15.17). Here it refers to the plur. subject of the verb in
the main clause; cf. Gordon UT 1024.7f.: t sr rmmdtbln bugrt (eleven
artisans who work in Ugarit). This passage incidentally attests features which
we have noted throughout this work, the 3rd plur. masc. of the imperfect in t,
the energic ending of the imperfect, the relative particle d and the phonetic
variant b for p.
20. In v. 20a there is one word too many for the metre. LXX reads In my skin
my esh rots, my bones were ripped in my teeth. This indicates the reading
ber ber rqa, which was read by Merx and Dhorme. In support of MT
deqh, which Merx would emend to rqa, cf. Ps. 102.6: deqh am
lier (my bones cleave to my esh). The familiarity of the writer may
account for the inclusion of er in 20. Hence we would read ber deqh
am (my bones cleave to my skin), and suggest that the text has been upset
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by the failure to note a word-play in r (skin) in v. 20a, but pledge in

v. 20b; cf. Arab. iratu(n) (loan) from the root ra, yar, which may
suggest the translation of Isa. 53.12, heerh lammwe na (with slight
emendation of the verb) as he gave himself a pledge to death. ber, superuous in v. 20a, seems to have been displaced from after v. 20b, where it was
misunderstood after r, taken as skin and corrupted to innay. Hence in
v. 20b we propose the reading wemalleh ber ber (and I have escaped
on the forfeiture of my esh). This means that in his emaciated condition the
sufferer has just survived, leaving his esh a pledge in the hands of death.
21. Job claims not censure but pity since his suffering is the touch of the hand
of God, which was not to be assessed or judged by human reason; cf. the
reference to the hand of God in the plagues of Egypt, which left the local
magicians incompetent (Exod. 8.15). The Arabs have a delicate reaction to
illness or abnormality as the touch of Allah.
22. After the reference to the hand of God, which ought to have spared Job
the censure of his friends, the MT reading em l would be readily intelligible, though Fohrer, presumably discriminating between l and elah, takes
l in the sense of demon. We might agree with Fohrer so far as to render
like a god. In accordance with the inveterate opposition of Jobs adversaries
in v. 22a, it is likely that the eating of a persons esh in v. 22b is the idiom
familiar in Ass., Aram. and Syr. to slander; cf. Dan. 3.8; 6.26 and Syr.
akalqar (the Devil, lit. slanderer). Sexual abuse suggested by Tur-Sinai
and adopted by Pope here and at 31.31 is, in our opinion, quite gratuitous.
23. LXX reads v. 24b immediately after v. 23b, v. 23a being inserted in LXX
from Theodot., which would give the reading:
23a.
24a.
23b.
24b.
m-yittn weyikke milly

be-barzel were
m-yittn basser weyuq
la bar yen
In v. 23b ser does not mean book, as the verb qaq (to engrave) indicates, but inscription (so Gehman 1944: 303ff., citing the word in Phoenician). An inscription on a copper plaque (Akk. siparru, Arab. sifru[n]) has
been suggested (so Hlscher, Mowinckel, Terrien, Pope); cf. the copper scroll
from Qumran. This, however, does not accord with the reference to lead. But
there is a notable instance of an inscription engraved in rock with vestiges of
lead lling possibly to preserve it against weather, but probably to make it
more conspicuous and legible. This is the inscription of Darius I on the rock of
Behistun (Weidner 194551: 146f.). This monument was doubtless well
known through Jewish settlers in Persia after the Exile and to travelling
merchants and other Jews with wide-spread business interests like Murashu
Sons (Clay 1898).
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25. The passage contained in vv. 25-27 is to be understood in the context of

vv. 23-24, Jobs wish that a memorial of his integrity should be inscribed on a
rock as a permanent record of the justice of his case. In vv. 25ff. he goes
further, declaring his certainty of actual vindication by a living vindicator
(gl ay). Therefore we should take k in the adversative senseBut. We
agree with Fohrer that grammar demands that v. 25a should be rendered I
know the One who will vindicate me is vital. No mere memorial would
satisfy Job, but vindication by a living vindicator, we might fairly infer the
living God. Besides the contrast to vv. 25-24, the adjective might signify the
living God in contrast to the God of the orthodox dogma in the statements of
Jobs friends. There may also be the nuance of effective, as Fohrer claims,
cf. elhm ay in Hezekiahs prayer (Isa. 37.15-20 = 2 Kgs 18.29-33) with
reference to the Assyrians questioning of the efcacy of Yahweh. This
convinces us that Jobs gl is God and not an intermediary, which seems to
us to be corroborated by elah in emphatic nal position in v. 26b in what we
regard as a striking inclusio in vv. 25-26. The connotation of gl in the OT,
as distinct from peh (one who redeems by paying the price of redemption),
one who rehabilitates or vindicates, with social connotation, militates against
the interpretation of the word here in the Christian sense of Redeemer pace
Handel and RV. Jobs longing throughout the Book is not for redemption from
sin and its consequences, but for the vindication of his moral right, which he
consistently avers until his great oath of purgation (ch. 31). Jobs vindication
is cast in the gure of the gl, the kinsman who has the duty of rehabilitating
one of his family in his rightful possession, like Boaz in Ruth, or who avenged
the blood of his kinsman (gl haddm). It extended to Yahwehs rehabilitation of his people, especially in Deutero-Isaiah; for example, in Isa. 44.6,
where the Divine Vindicator is also entitled rn weaarn, which we
consider to afford a clue to the signicance of aarn in v. 25b.
We seriously question whether aarn here means afterwards (T), at
the end (S), or at the last day (V with Christian implications). The word is
formally an adjective or noun. Mowinckel (1925: 211) after Siegfried (1893)
took aarn as the synonymous, or rather complementary, parallel of gl,
both referring to a celestial intermediary, and rendered aarn as Brger
(Guarantor or Sponsor, so NEB). This sense of aarn is not attested in the
OT, but may be supported by aary in Aram. and Late Heb., and might
refer to Jobs celestial supporter in 16.19. But we consider this doubtful, and
on the grounds that we have already cited we are still more doubtful of
Mowinckels view that gl is an intermediary like Jobs witness in 16.19
rather than God himself.
It has been proposed that aarn signies the party in a lawsuit who has the
nal argument and therefore the advantage over his opponent (so G.R. Driver
1950a: 46); cf. Prov. 18.17:
He who speaks in his case (seems) right;
but his colleague comes forward and gives him a grilling.
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On the other hand, if aarn has the same sense as in the Divine title rn
weaarn (Isa. 44.6) it would refer to God as nal authority, who ultimately
consummates what He has initiated, who disposes as He has proposed; hence
our rendering nal authority.
It has been held that Job declares his condence that he would be vindicated
after death. This begs the question of the signicance of r in v. 25b, which
admittedly signies occasionally the dust of the grave (17.16; 20.11; 21.26;
Isa. 26.19; Ps. 22.30 [EVV 29]; Dan. 12.2), but may also mean earth, as in
5.4; 10.9; 14.1; 41.25 (EVV 33). Again Jobs appeal that his blood should
remain where it has been shed, uncovered until it is avenged (16.18f.), might
be cited in support of the vindication of his just cause after death. But this may
be too literal an interpretation of a striking gure of speech. Any view of Jobs
hope of vindication after death seems emphatically contradicted by the wholly
negative prospect of death in 14.22 and elsewhere throughout the Book, for
instance, in 3.13-19; 7.8-10, 21 and particularly 14.13-21, where any gleam of
hope of justication after death (14.13-15) is categorically dismissed in the
immediate sequel (14.14-21). We consider the question to be settled by Jobs
declaration that he will see God (19.27) and, we suggest, be admitted to the
confrontation (eezeh, 19.26b) he so ardently desires. This suggests to us that
the formally ambiguous r means (this) earth. In this context we would
note the pregnant sense of yqm connoting the decisive and powerful intervention of God in human affairs (as in Num. 10.27; Isa. 2.19-21; Jer. 2.27; cf.
Job 31.14) rather than physical stance.
26. In v. 26a MT bristles with problems. aar (after) followed by the indicative of the verb MT niqqe without the relative particle aer is anomalous, and
has suggested the reading Aram. r (I shall see; cf. the critical apparatus
of BH3), which might give a synonymous parallel to eezeh in v. 26b. On this
reading r would require an object, which might be the original of MT r,
such as (so BH3, apparatus criticus) or, nearer to MT zer (my helper);
cf. Jobs celestial supporter in 16.19, which might support Mowinckels understanding of aarn as a celestial intermediary in chiastic parallelism. MT
niqqe z is attested in LXX, the verb being rendered variously exhausted
and accomplished, cf. V enwrapped, as from qthe other ancient versions either ignore or offer a reading which does not reect MT or anything
resembling it. The apparatus criticus in BH3 suggests the reading yizq ,
which we consider doubtful since e as nota accusativa in Job is practically
limited to the prose Prologue and Epilogue. On this reading (who will raise
me up?), the verb would demand the original of MT r, for example , as
suggested in BH3; cf. 16.19, or, we might suggest, zer (my helper), and
mer (my liberator), both intermediaries. MT r and mibber, however,
are unanimously attested in the ancient versions. Thus we nd that the only
viable alternative is the reading of the awkward MT after E.F. Sutcliffe (1950:
377), followed by R. Tournay (1962: 492ff.; 1967: 129) and Lvque (1970:
ad loc.):
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wer niqqa mibber
weaar z eezeh elah
which we would render

And though my skin is stripped from my esh,
Even after that I shall come face to face with God.
Taking the verb nqa in the sense it has in Isa. 10.34 (forests stripped by
storm) and Isa. 24.13 (olive berries struck off), this reading has the merit of
simplicity and retaining the elements of MT with rearrangement. Reecting the
skin disease in the Prologue as evidence of the alienation of the sufferer from
God, Job declares that though his sufferings are intensied to the ultimate
degree he will be accorded the confrontation for which he longed with God as
He really is (wel zr, v. 27b), sympathetic, who will vindicate the right of his
faithful servant (1.8).
In vv. 26b and 27a eezeh is used twice, which is exceptional in Job. If in
both cases the verb means see, as in v. 27ab, the reference may be to the
intensity of the subjects vision beyond the supercial, as in Amos 1.1f.; Isa.
1.1; 2.1; Mic. 1.1; Ezek. 24.4, 16; cf. the repetition of the verb in the innitive
absolute and the indicative. But, according to the word-play favoured by the
author of Job, eezeh in v. 26b might be a homonym of zh, to see, meaning to confront, the experience Job consistently desires; cf. zeh, the breast
of a sacricial animal (Exod. 29.6; Lev. 7.30; 8.29; Num. 6.20; 19.19all P);
cf. Arab. i(n), opposite, and the verb a meaning in the VIIth Form to
sit opposite one another, which we prefer on stylistic grounds.
27. The last word in v. 27b, zr, is patient of various interpretations in the
context. It may mean strange in the sense of other or estranged and might
refer to Job or to God. Baumgrtel, G.B. Gray, Weiser, Lindblom, Pope and
G.R. Driver take it to refer to God as estranged from Job. Driver supports this
interpretation by the assumption that l after eezeh in the parallel colon
means on my side. The hyphen in MT, however, indicates that l is the ethic
dative emphasizing the personal pronouns in an and nay (so Terrien and
Fohrer). This suggests that wel-zr means and no other (cf. Prov. 27.2; Ben
Sira 40.29) referring to Job (so Dhorme, Ehrlich, Hlscher, Gordis, Fohrer
after LXX). In view of Jobs complaint that he is treated by his own household
as zr (v. 15), we should note the suggestion of L.A. Snijders (1954) that zr
refers to Job as estranged. Whether the word refers to God or to Job, the
phrase might form an apt inclusio with gal in v. 25a. We consider zr in its
normal sense in the OT too strong a term for other, but in its normal sense of
stranger it is an excellent antithetic parallel to gl, with the traditional
implications of a kinsman as vindicator, in inclusio. An additional implication
may be the contrast between the living God as Jobs vindicator and that other
God of orthodox dogma represented by the three friends.
1
The Book of Job
277
In the context of the imperfect eezeh we would understand the imperfect

sense of rh in v. 27b, which consequently we read as the innitive absolute
rh for MT r. In vv. 25-27, in accordance with our view that the survival
of death is alien to the thought of the Book of Job those verbs cannot be taken
in the physical sense, but as meaning that Job will come to see his relationship
with God as it truly is, as in his declaration in 42.5 and the experience of
Isaiah in the moment of revelation (Isa. 6.5). By the same token, yqm in
v. 25b is, we consider, to be taken not in a literal sense, but of decisive Divine
intervention in human affairs; see above on 25b.
If v. 27c belongs with vv. 25-27b, it expresses the ardent desire of the
sufferer for the deliverance expressed in that passage; cf. Ps. 119.123, nay
kl le (my eyes fail [looking] for Thy deliverance). kilyay (lit. my
kidneys) is the seat of emotion for the ancient Hebrews. Within my bosom
(beq) seems strange anatomy, but q means generally inside, and the
phrase indicates intimate being; cf. na in a similar context in Ps. 84.3. On
the analogy of those passages in the Psalms, v. 27b is best taken as the rst
colon of an incomplete bicolon.
28. l is best taken as the Aram. nota accusativa with the pronominal sufx,
the object of the verb. We take mh as the interrogative pronoun, here signifying How?; cf. 9.2 mah-yyidaq (how will he prove his innocence?, what
will he cite to prove his innocence?). English the root of the matter is found
in him is misleading. The language is forensic. In the context dr means a
case (cf. Exod. 8.16; 24.14). Hence re dr means pretext for a case (so
Dhorme). In the introduction k may best be taken as But.
29. This verse has caused much perplexity among commentators, among
whom there is no agreement nor, we believe, any satisfactory solution through
the rendering of amh as wrath and assenting that in both instances MT
ore means sword. We propose that MT amh, an Aram. form, is cognate
with Arab. amyatu(n) (excess of zeal). Throughout Job the apparently identical word in parallel cola indicates a word-play. Thus we would take ere in
v. 29a as sword, the sword of God, as in Ezekiel 21, as Fohrer has well
noted, and propose that in v. 29b the abstract noun from ra (to destroy)
should be read re (ruin, destruction), v. 29b then meaning excessive zeal
in wrong courses spells ruin. Thus, we believe Job passes judgment on the
excessive zeal of his friends to represent him as a sinner meriting his
afictions, and as defenders of the current doctrine of the theodicy despite the
hard facts of experience.
In MT addn ([know] that there is a judgment), the reading eyy dn or
possibly eyy dayyn (that there is a judge) seems more suitable. The
relative particle ecf. Phoenician and Akk. athough common in Late
Heb., is attested as early as the Song of Deborah (Judg. 5.7). This would
nevertheless be the only instance in the Book of Job, and the odd colon always
1
278
leaves a doubt as to whether it is the member of an incomplete colon, where

for want of a parallel the text is doubtful, or is a late gloss. It is alternatively
suggested that MT addn is a scribal error for adday (the Almighty) (so
Fischer 1961: 342ff.) and Pope. In this case, if the text is complete, the verb
would mean not know in the intellectual sense but acknowledge.
Job 20
THE REPLY OF ZOPHAR
If Zophars reply to Jobs statement in ch. 19 is not simply a restatement of his

former assertion of the theodicy with an accumulation of proverbs and gures
from Wisdom literature in the manner of Oriental argument, it is still a direct
reply to Jobs declaration that he knows for certain the One who will vindicate
him (19.25). His reply is introduced by the rhetorical question Do you not
know? (20.4), which introduces the time-honoured dicta of the sages on the
social Order, repeatedly borne out by experience from the time that humans
were put upon the earth. In reply to the embarrassment to faith of the
prosperity of the wicked so frequently felt and expressed in the Plaint of the
Sufferer and in Wisdom poems (e.g. Ps. 73.3-11) as the prelude to their sure
and often sudden fall (Pss. 73.18-20; 34.9-20), Zophar amplies this theme
with very striking imagery redolent of life in Palestine and its natural environment. Besides the sudden downfall of the wicked (vv. 4-7), their temporary
prosperity, eeting as a dream (vv. 8-9), the inherent weakness of wickedness
is emphasized. Zophar adduces a series of gures, sickness through overindulgence in rich food (vv. 13-16), insatiable appetite (v. 17), anxiety (vv. 2022), the vain efforts to escape retribution (vv. 24-25; cf. Amos 5.19f.), and
nal destruction by re which needs no fanning and ood and downpours
on the day of (Gods) wrath. Finally in conrmation of this assertion of Order
in society, Zophar sets this in Cosmic dimension in citing the testimony of
heaven and earth (v. 27).
After a short introductory strophe of two bicola (vv. 2-3) in the style of
sapiential controversy, Zophars reply takes the form of a wisdom poem on the
fate of the wicked in support of the theodicy. This is divided according to
aspects of the subject and gures of speech into seven strophes (vv. 4-7, 8-9 +
11, 12-16, 17-19 + 10, 20-23, 24-26, 27-29). These are composed of a number
of gures emphasizing aphorisms on the general theme of the retribution of
the wicked, whose sin is his own undoing, and on the evanescence of his illgotten advantages. Those gures related to this theme are reminiscent of the
couplets in Proverbs, but are here treated at greater length, not in couplets, but
in strophes of three or four couplets.
The text is slightly disarranged. A double word-play indicates that v. 10
belonged originally after v. 19.
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280
Job 20. The Reply of Zophar
Chapter 20
1.
Then Zophar the Naamathite answered and said:
2.
On this my racking thoughts prompt an answer

On account of1 my own deep-felt shame,
Hearing myself shamefully rebuked.
So after full consideration the spirit (within me) replies:2
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
10.
20.
21.
22.
Do you not3 know this from of old,

From the time that humanity was put on the earth,
That the jubilation of the wicked is but for a short time,
That the joy of the impious is but for a moment?
Though his exaltation rises to the skies
And his head touches the clouds,
In proportion to his pre-eminence he perishes for ever;
Those who saw him will say, Where is he?
As a dream he ies away, and none will nd him,
Dispelled like a vision of the night;
The eye that noticed him will do so no more,
And the place where he was will see him no longer.
His bones are full of lustiness,4
But his prime5 shall lie in the dust,
Though wickedness is sweet in his mouth
And he lets it melt away under his tongue,
Though he cherishes it and will not let it go,
Holding it back on his palate,
His food in his bowels will be changed
To venom of asps within him.
The wealth he gorges will be spewed up;
God will expel it from his belly.
6He shall suck the poison of asps,
The tongue of the viper shall slay him.6
He will not be satised with streams of olive-oil,7
Nor torrents running with honey and curds;
The reward of his toil8 he will not swallow,
None of the wealth9 gained from his trade will he enjoy.
Since he has crushed the poor with force,10
Plundered a house that he has not built,11
His sons will make restitution to the poor,
And his children12 pay back13 his wealth.
Since he has never been at ease14 in his belly,
Allowing none to escape his greed,15
None escaping from his devouring,
Therefore his goods shall not abide.
For all his full abundance he will be anxious,
All the force of trouble16 shall come upon him.
The Book of Job

23.
his belly is full,17

(God) shall hurl the vehemence of his anger at him,
And shall shower upon him the ame of his wrath.18
24.
He may ee from the iron weapon,

The bronzed bow shall transx him;
The shaft shall19 come clean through his body,20
And the gleaming blade go out from his liver.
21For him terrors are in store,
Total darkness is reserved.
A re that needs no fanning22 will consume him,23
He who survives in his tent shall be crushed.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
281
17If
The heavens will reveal his guilt,

And the earth shall rise up against him;
A ood24 shall roll away25 his house,
Downpours on the day of (Gods) wrath.
This is the portion of the wicked26 from God,
And the heritage of the rebel27 from God.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
1
Reading baar for MT aar, assuming dittography of w after y in the script

used as in the Qumran texts.
Reading taann for MT yaann in agreement with the fem. subject rua.
Reading hal z with LXX and one Heb. MS.
Reading almm for MT almyw, assuming corruption of nal m to w in the Old
Heb. script, perhaps after scriptio defective in almm.
Reading amm for MT imm. See Commentary ad loc.
This verse is probably a gloss.
Reading pale yihr for MT pela nahar, assuming corruption of y and t to
and n in the Old Heb. script.
Reading ye l for MT y wel after one Heb. MS.
Reading ml for MT kel, m being corrupted to k in the Old Heb. script.
Conjecturing adverbial zm for MT za. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading bnh for MT yienh with V, and l for MT wel, understanding a relative clause without the relative particle as often as in Hebrew and Ugaritic poetry.
Reading wlyw for MT yyw suggested by the parallelism.
Reading ye-n for MT tn, a corruption after the corruption of wlyw to
yyw. See Commentary ad loc.
Omitting lw as a gloss metri causa. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading beome for MT baam.
Reading ml with LXX and V for MT ml.
This colon is probably to be omitted as a gloss, as indicated by the original LXX.
Reading lyw mabbl umm for MT lm bilem. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading ela for MT la as suggested by LXX.
Reading miggwh for MT miggwh as suggested by LXX.
Reading lyw mm lienm / kol-e mn. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading nupph for MT nupp in agreement with the gender of .
Reading telh for MT teelh.
282
24.
25.
26.
27.

Reading yl for MT yel with one Heb. MS. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yl with LXX for MT yiel.
m should probably be omitted.
Reading mreh for MT imr. See Commentary ad loc.
2. eippm here as in 4.13 denotes the movement this way and that of thoughts
in the embarrassment to orthodoxy involved in Jobs attitude. The Hiphil of
, with dr understood, means answer with the direct object of the
person. Here it may mean make an answer without the direct object. LXX
reads l n for MT ln. Hence Stevenson reads untrue are the thoughts
you address to us, reading eippm ten. The reading of LXX, this is not
the answer my thoughts suggest to me, would be nearer MT. But the emendation of MT ln is in our opinion gratuitous. In MT aar , for which
V offers only a paraphrase which has no relevance to MT, various emendations
have assumed that v. 2b is the direct parallel of v. 2a. We regard the parallelism as extending to the whole strophe. Verses 2-3 are chiastic, v. 2a being
parallel to v. 3b and v. 2b to v. 3a. Thus we propose that is parallel to
msar kelimm (my shameful rebuke), and take as cognate of Arab.
a, Akk. yau (to feel shame). In (lit. my shame is in me),
denotes the personal sense of shame; cf. ly in Ps. 42.6, 12. In kelimm the
pronominal sufx is objective. In the middle members of the chiasmus Zophar
declares that his orthodoxy, which Job has endeavoured to put to shame,
prompts a reply. In v. 2a and v. 3b discriminating assessment (bnh) between
(bn) this proposition and that (eippm) indicates that Job has succeeded in
disturbing the conventional moral philosophy of the friends, which is now
thrown sharply on the defensive.
3. In support of his rendering of MT msar kelimm (lesson which outrages
me) after V, Dhorme cites msar elmn (the chastisement which is our
wholeness) in Isa. 53.5. The phrase ra mibbn in v. 3b may signify that,
though roused and embarrassed by Job, he is nevertheless moved to retort by
the spirit, here probably the special insight claimed by the sage but controlled
by his intellect. If he goes on to cite what seems to be based on aphorisms of
former sages, he emphasizes his own discrimination.
4. The condent expectation of an afrmative answer demands the reading
hal either with or without z. m may either be perfect passive with m
as subject or innitive construct with God understood as subject; cf. God set
humanity upon the earth (Gen. 2.8f.) and God created humanity on the earth
(Dan. 4.32).
The Book of Job
283
5. rennh (cf. 3.7; Pss. 53.6; 100.2) derived from rnan (to give a ringing,
exultant cry, rinnh), means jubilation, both joy and the cry of joy.
miqqr (of short duration) is a prepositional phrase usually spatial but here
temporal, denoting a near objective. The parallel a-ra (pausal) means
for the icker of an eyelid, ad momentum. On n see on 8.13.
6. MT , in the sense his elevation, a verbal noun from n, for the more
usual , is read by all versions but LXX, which translates gift, obviously
wrongly. The sense arrogance (Aq., Sym., Theod.; so Hlscher, Pope) is possible as in Ps. 89.10, where the form is , but here the parallel his head
reaches the clouds indicates that the word means either stature or
exaltation.
7. MT keelal has been taken by various commentators as dung; cf. Arab.
jallatu(n) and Ezek. 4.12, 15 (so V and Le Hir, Loisy, Renan, G.B. Gray,
Hlscher, Pope, thinking of dung to be swept up as refuse; cf. 1 Kgs 14.10).
Duhm and Fohrer after Wetzstein propose his dung-re, sc. re of dried
dung, as in the desert, where fuel is scarce. Dhorme proposes as translation
phantom, citing Ass. gallu (evil demon or ghost). Cheyne proposed to
emend to ke (his glory) which is supported by LXX. This may indicate
that the word is cognate of Arab. jalla (to be illustrious; e.g. jalllatuhu, His
Majesty). This is the meaning accepted by Gordis. We propose that since
there is nothing in the parallelism to suggest dung, the meaning is preeminence, though a word-play with dung was possibly intended. ke may
denote in proportion to, but, introducing the last couplet of the strophe, it
may possibly be not a preposition but an enclitic clinching the argument as in
Ugaritic, for example, in Gordon UT 9.13; 13.46; on k emphasizing the
nal verb, cf. Deut. 32.9. The vanishing of the wicked without trace is a
common theme of Wisdom poetry; cf. 14.10; Ps. 37.36.
8. MT yimh may be retained, the subject being indenite and the form
tantamount to a passive, which is read in LXX, S and V yudda (is put to
ight) may be retained (so Hitzig, Beer, Budde, Ball, G.B. Gray, Hlscher,
Fohrer, Pope, Gordis).
9. za (to notice) occurs in the OT only here and at 28.7 and Song 1.6,
where it is probably a corruption. It has been suggested that terenn should
be emended to yerenn in agreement with meqm. mqm, however,
though generally masc., is occasionally fem., as for example in Gen. 18.24;
1 Sam. 17.12. The verb, meaning to observe, notice, see, is rather poetic, and
is used more frequently in Job (e.g. 7.8; 17.15; 20.9; 24.15; 33.14, 27; 34.29;
35.14) than in the rest of the OT.
284
10. The disappearance of the wicked having been noted, it is not unnatural to
mention the fate of his sons. But, since v. 12 deals with the end of the wicked,
v. 10 is either a gloss (so Duhm) or displaced from after v. 19 (so Dhorme),
where it would be most apt. See below after note on v. 19.
11. Reading almm in scriptio defectiva for MT almyw, the word being an
abstract plur., cf. zeqnm (old age), nerm (youth). Thus almm may
mean youth; cf. Ugaritic lm, Arab. ulmu(n) (young man), perhaps with
the nuance of sexual maturity. Note Arab. alima (to be sexually excited)
and Heb. almah (Isa. 7.14), where the word denotes not virgin, but a virgin
bride, as in the Ras Shamra poems, hence a young woman sexually mature,
bearing her rst child. tika presents a problem of agreement if, as MT
suggests, the subject is almm (MT almyw). Dhormes citation of Ps. 103.5
tiadd kanneer nerye may possibly warrant such an agreement,
assuming that the abstract plur. is tantamount to a fem. abstract. But in the
psalm tiadd may be written defectively for tiadde as the predicate of
the fem. na, with neray as an accusative of respect. We suggest that the
subject of the fem. singular tik is amm (his prime), cognate with Arab.
umumu(n) (completeness), which we read for MT imm, and propose as an
excellent correspondent to almm (lustiness). On r (dust) meaning
either the earth, ground or true dust of the grave, see above on 19.25b.
12. ka means to hide, the Hiphil meaning to make to disappear, hence
Fohrers proposal to make melt away, gradually to prolong the savour, as the
context suggests.
13. mal al means to spare, that is, he cherishes. za means to free or
let go as to leave, abandon; cf. 10.1, as in the legal phrase r wezb
(restrained, left free, cf. Exod. 23.5). The Ugaritic cognate db is used of the
release of a hunting falcon, Gordon UT 3 Aqht 7.33.
14. nepa is the declaratory perfect.
15. hr, lit. to make to inherit, or possess, means also to dispossess as
here and regularly in the accounts of occupation of the land which involved
dispossession of the inhabitants.
16. r generally signies the bitter juice of a poisonous herb; cf. Amos 6.12;
Jer. 8.14; 9.14; 23.15 (m r). It is parallel to merrh (cf. v. 14), in Deut.
32.32, which, as here, describes the venom of the serpent (peen; cf. btn in the
Ras Shamra texts) in Deut. 32.33.
17. MT al-yre would be an optative usage of the jussive. But al is used as a
negative particle with the indicative in the Ras Shamra texts, so that the verb
1
The Book of Job
285
may be emended to yireh in scriptio defectiva. We take the verb as a byform

of the more familiar rwh (to be satised, drink ones ll) (so too TurSinai), which is attested in Prov. 23.31; Ben Sira 34.28 and probably Prov.
31.4, where w r is probably a corruption of r r (Thomas 1962:
499-500). We nd the root also attested in Ugaritic, Gordon UT nt I, 12-13,
bk rb m ri (a large goblet mighty of draught). The parallel with naal
dea weemh suggests the emendation of nahar to yihr, as proposed by
Klostermann; cf. Gordon UT 49 III, 6-7: mm mn tmrn nlm tlk nbtm (The
skies rain [olive] oil, The wadis run with honey), describing Els vision of the
revival of nature with the revival of Baal.
18. For MT y, ye should probably be read with one Heb. MS, meaning
lit. that which he laboured for, or his toil. For MT m LXX read law
(for nothing). The parallel l temr (the wealth from his trade) suggests
that m is a noun cognate with Arab. awbu(u) (reward) from the verb
ba yabu. In wel, in v. 18a and b, w should be attached respectively to
ye and taken as a dittograph of w in temr. The verb las in the sense to
enjoy is attested besides the present passage only once, in Prov. 7.18, of
sexual enjoyment.
19, 10. By reading v. 10 after v. 19 the sense is restored in a more natural
context and two cases of word-play are recovered:
19.
10.
k ra (for MT ria)zm (for MT za) dallm

bayi gzal l (for MT wel) bnh (for MT yibenh)
bnyw yera dallm
wlyw (for MT weyyw) y (for MT tnh) n
Since he has crushed the poor with force,
Plundered a house that he had not built,
His sons will make restitution to the poor,
And his children pay back his wealth.
We assume the reading l nh as a relative clause without the relative

particle. The phrase recalls Mic. 2.2. The condemnation is of the oppressor
who plunders a house or family (both bayi), which, in virtue of his status, he
ought rather to have rehabilitated (bnh; cf. Ruth 4.10-12) as a social duty.
Here the word-play must be noticed between ra as in v. 10a (to crush) and
rh (Piel), to make restitution; cf. Lev. 26.34, 41, 43 and Isa. 40.2, where
the Niphal is used, and between bnh and bnyw.
20. MT lw is suspect for two reasons. It makes the metre in v. 20a too long,
and, if it were admitted, the noun alwh rather than the participle lw is
demanded if ya means he knew. Both difculties are obviated if we admit
the proposal of D.W. Thomas (1935: 409-12) that ya here is cognate with
Arab. wadaa (to be at ease), in which case lw may be dismissed as a
gloss on the ambiguous ya. For MT baam we read beome, the verbal
1
286
noun for the passive participle. Here be means from as the verb demands,
which is regularly the use of the preposition in Ugaritic, which has no preposition min.
21. In leoel after r (survivor), le, here from, has a similar force to be,
as also in Ugaritic. l is used here as also in Ps. 10.5, if the text is sound, in
the sense to be strong, rm. These are the only two incidences of the verb in
this sense in the OT, which is probably Aram., being well known in the intensive meaning to make rm.
22. The sentiment recalls semper avarus eget (the miser is ever in want
[Horace, Ep. 1.2.5b]). The plur. mel is a case of fem. plur. with the force of
an abstract noun, abundance; cf. ten, understanding (Isa. 40.14), d,
knowledge (1 Sam. 2.3), haww, fall (Ps. 5.10), menu, rest (Ps. 23.2),
etc. (see GKC, 124e). eq is better known in the verbal root aq, meaning plenty; cf. 36.18. If v. 22a were considered in isolation, yer l might
mean he is in want, but the parallelism in v. 22b indicates the meaning he is
anxious; cf. 15.21; 18.12. With LXX and V, ml (trouble) may be read for
MT ml (maker of trouble), which is also possible. y on the reading we
adopt means not literally hand but power.
23. yeh is jussive introducing a protasis without the conditional particle in a
hypothesiscf. 22.28 (GKC, 109b)but the whole phrase yeh lemall bin
is probably a later gloss on v. 22, as indicated by its omission in LXX. In view
of the mention of missiles in the sequel, Dhorme suggests the reading
weyamr olmyw bilem (and he shall shower his shafts on his body) for
MT weyamr lm bilem. This reading and rendering of olmyw and
lem is based respectively on Ass. ulmu (an arrow or dart) and lemm
parallel to dmm in Zeph. 1.17. The parallelism, however, with arn app
supports the reading after Dahood (1957: 314ff.).
weyamr lyw mabbl umm (and he shall shower upon him the ame
of his wrath). On mabbl, cf. Ugaritic nbl and see above on 18.15. The language recalls Gods shower of re and brimstone on Sodom and Gemorrah
(Gen. 19.24; cf. Ps. 11.6).
24. neq is usually collective, meaning arms. la (to pass from one point
of place or time to another; cf. 9.11) is found in the sense to pass through,
pierce in Judg. 5.26.
qee nehcf. Ps. 18.35 (EVV 34)means not bronze bow or bronze
arrow from the bow, but bronzed bow, that is, a composite bow of laminations of wood and strips of horn and animal sinew as described in the Ugaritic
Legend of Aqht (Gordon UT 2 Aqht VI, 20-23), and probably bound at
intervals, whipped like a split cane shing rod, with bronze wire.
1
The Book of Job
287
25. For la (to be unsheathed), ela (shaft, dart; cf. Joel 2.8) should
probably be read with LXX, y for MT wayy, and miggwh (from his
back) for MT miggwh with LXX, V and T. In v. 25b, rq mimmerr
yahal, merrh, which means venom or gall in v. 14, means here the
organ thought to secrete the gall, the liver. brq, lit. lightning, may denote
gleaming blade; cf. Deut. 32.41; Hab. 3.11. LXX and V read yahal in the
plur., taking it as the predicate of mm (terrors) being enm (stored up)
in v. 26a (for MT enyw), le being the asseverative enclitic before the predicate in a nominal sentence as in Arab. The rearranged text in vv. 25-26 reads:
ela y miggwh
rq mimmerr yahal
lyw mm lienm
kol-e mn
This arrangement obviates the metric irregularity in MT v. 26a.

26. For MT nuppa either nupph or neuh must be read in agreement
with the fem. . We have preferred the perfect Pual in a relative clause where
the relative particle is omitted as often in poetry; cf. the relative in Arab. after
an indenite antecedent. Note the further emendation of MT teelh to
telh after LXX, S, V and T. We take yra as the Niphal imperf. of raa,
an Aramaism (Heb. ra).
27. The general statement about heaven and earth revealing a persons sin and
earth rising up as an enemy against that person is more natural after the
particular calamities, such as ood (v. 28) and re (v. 26). miqmm is found
as parallel to y in 27.7. S apparently read minaqqemh (avenger), which
would reect more specically the earth calling for vengeance for blood shed
(cf. the gure in 16.18f. and Gen. 4.10). If MT is read, however, the passage
may reect the convention expressed in treaties of calling to witness the
various gods of the parties and heaven and earth and other natural features, as
illustrated in Hittite vassal-treaties from the fourteenth and thirteenth centuries
BCE; cf. Deut. 30.19.
28. For MT yiel, pointed as if from glh (to be deported), read yl from
glal (to roll, transitive); cf. Gen. 29.3, 8 (to roll a stone from the wellmouth), which is suggested by LXX (drag away) and T (be removed). yel,
which regularly means produce or increase, may be a variation of yl; cf.
yiel mayim, 30.25; 44.4, cognate with Arab. wablu(n) (heavy rain); cf. also
Akk. bubbulu (ood), cited by Dhorme (so Beer, Ehrlich, Stevenson, Fohrer
and Pope). Only T has appreciated the meaning of niggar, rendering, though
paraphrasing, ow. The root nar in the Niphal here is known from 2 Sam.
14.4, mayim niggrm (owing water), and Lam. 3.49, n niggrh (my
eye has owed), and in the Hiphil in Ps. 75.9, of the pouring out of the Lords
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fury, and in the Hophal in Mic. 1.4, of water poured down a declivity; cf. ngr,
water-pourer in a rite of imitative magic in the Ras Shamra Legend of Krt,
Gordon UH 126, III, 4, 7, 8, 11, 12.
29. The superuous m has crept into the text, being originally perhaps a
scribal note, to indicate that the personal r should be read and not rea (so
Duhm). We expect a parallel to r in the position of MT imr, and the
simplest solution is to read mr (rebel). Dhorme retains imr, which he
understands on the analogy of mmrh (the word) for the person of God in
the Targum, as himself (so T at 7.8; 19.18; 27.3). While this is far from
deciding the case, it deserves consideration. Stevenson read amryw, translating his appointed share, sc. his ordered share, associating the word with
Arab. amara (to command), but, while Heb. has occasionally this nuance,
amryw (his appointed share) is extremely unlikely. In accordance with his
theory, that Job was the Heb. translation of an Aram. original, Tur-Sinai
makes the interesting suggestion that an original mmrh, to be pointed memreh
(rebel), was mistaken by a Heb. translator for Aram. mmrh (his word),
which was then rendered into imr, as in MT. In the case of translation,
however, it is unlikely that a comparatively rare word like mer would have
been preferred to the more usual dr. We consider that the original was
mreh (rebel).
Job 21
JOBS REJOINDER TO ZOPHAR
This chapter falls into nine strophes (vv. 2-5, 6-9, 10-13, 14-16, 17-18, 19-21,
22-26, 27-30, 31-34), the last of which, we propose, has suffered disturbance
reading originally vv. 31, 32a, 33a, 33b, 33c, 32b, 34; see Commentary ad loc.
The literary afnity is with the sapiential disputation. In the rst strophe
(vv. 2-5) Job states his claim to voice his complaint. The second strophe (vv.
6-9) poses the problem of the orthodox belief in the theodicy in face of the
empiric fact of the prosperity of the wicked. The third (vv. 10-13), ending with
the statement of the peaceful demise of the wicked, cites concrete and colourful instances of their prosperity. The fourth strophe (vv. 14-16) describes the
deant attitude of the wicked to God in a series of bold statements. The fth
strophe (vv. 17-18) questions the validity of certain aphorisms concerning
the theodicy which are cited from proverb-collections such as the Book of
Proverbs. The sixth strophe (vv. 19-22) cites from another of these God stores
up iniquity for their sons (v. 19a), to which the defenders of the conventional
belief in the theodicy against the embarrassing facts cited by Job would resort,
and states that this would not impress the sinner himself. The seventh strophe
(vv. 22-25) opens with a statement concerning the transcendence of God and
the inscrutability of his wisdom. This is a recurrent argument of the friends.
Indeed it is the last resort of embarrassed orthodoxy, and it may be a citation
on the part of Job, who cites as evidence of the aloofness and apparent moral
indifference of God the common end of saint and sinner. In the eighth strophe
(vv. 27-30) Job states that he knows the orthodox premises and arguments (v.
27), which so far he has been citing from the fourth strophe to the seventh, and
which he continues to cite in v. 28. In confutation of the platitude of the
inexorable end of the wicked Job cites the testimony of wayfarers, by which
the writer may mean inscriptions or grafti where they thank their pagan gods
for safe guiding and preservation in their hazardous journeys. The ninth and
nal strophe (vv. 31, 32a, 33a, 33b, 33c, 32b, 34) in the conventional tradition
of Hebrew wisdom, clinches the argument by the colourful description of the
honourable burial of the wicked.
Jobs reply in ch. 21 opens with an appeal for a hearing, animadverting on
the consolation which his friends rst intended (2.21), and in the statement
you may mock (3b) addresses himself to Zophar and the others who, with a
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290
Job 21. Jobs Rejoinder to Zophar
wealth of striking images, had mocked the delusions and discomture of the
wicked after their prosperity. Job proceeds; he re-echoes the problem of the
sage in the Wisdom Psalm 73.2-12 (Job 21.6-16, 23-26), but whereas the sage
in the psalm, like Zophar, advances to a positive solution of the moral problem
in the not uncommon experience of the rascals sudden downfall and the
evanescence of his delusions (Ps. 73.18-20), Job uses the statement of the
sages dilemma as a contradiction to Zophars statement of the theodicy
(20.5ff.) and continues to elaborate his case by citing popular proverbs that
support the Wisdom teaching on the theodicy (vv. 17, 18, 19a, 22, 28), which
he immediately explodes (vv. 17, 18). To the proverb The trouble he incurs
God keeps in store for his sons (v. 19a), Job replies that this is not an
adequate defence of the doctrine of the theodicy so long as the wicked live out
their days in impunity (vv. 7-13). Jobs nal dismissal of Zophars case is to
remark upon the common mortality of both wicked and righteous (vv. 23-26),
with the added mockery of the splendid funeral of the ungodly (vv. 32-33). So
much, Job concludes, for the consolation of his friends which would convince
him of the justice of God despite the personal agony of the innocent sufferer,
whom they encourage to patient endurance and hope (5.8-26; 11.13-19) on the
strength of the doctrine of the theodicy which they support by citation of the
teaching of the sages and proverbs, while, blinking off unwelcome facts, they
simply deceive themselves and lead their friends into delusion (v. 34). By his
realistic citation of the prosperity of the wicked and his explosion of wellknown proverbs in his trenchant criticism of the traditional doctrine of sin and
retribution Job may well claim that his statement based on grim experience
should induce shocked silence in his hearers (v. 5). It is Jobs embarrassing
realism, which exhibits nothing of the faith under duress that Wisdom
recommended, that provokes the extreme condemnation of Eliphaz in ch. 22.
Chapter 21
1.
2.
Listen carefully to my words,

And let this be your consolation of me.
Bear with me and I will speak
Then after I have spoken you may mock.1
Is my complaint such that I should keep silence2
Why then should I not be impatient?
Turn to me and be appalled,3
And lay your hand on your mouth.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
When I think of it I am confounded,

And shuddering seizes my esh.
Why do the wicked live,
Prosper and grow mighty in power?
The Book of Job

8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
Their seed is established in their presence,

And their offspring stands fast4 before their eyes.
Their houses are safe from fear;
No rod of God is upon them.
Their bull5 engenders without fail,
Their cow6 calves, and does not cast her calf.
They send forth their little ones like a ock
And their children skip about;
They sing7 to the timbrel and the lyre,
And make merry to the sound of the pipe.
They nish8 their days in prosperity,
And go down9 to Sheol in peace.10
Though they say to God, Away from us!
We care not to know your ways!
What is the Almighty that we should serve him?
And what is the good of praying to him?
11See, their prosperity is not through their own power
The purpose of the wicked is far removed from Gods.12
How often is the lamp of the wicked put out?
How often does their calamity come upon them?
(He destroys malefactors in his wrath.)
(How often) are they as straw before the wind?
Or as chaff snatched away by a storm?
The trouble one incurs God keeps in store for his sons.
Let him (I say) requite the man himself, that he may feel it;
Let him himself13 drink his ll14 of his agon,15
Let him drink of the wrath of the Almighty!
For what does he care for his house after him,
Seeing that his own tale of months is allotted to him?
Will anyone teach God knowledge,
Seeing that he governs the exalted ones?
One dies, having quite fullled himself,
Quite at ease16 and in security,
His thighs17 are full of fat,18
And the marrow of his bones fresh.
Another dies embittered,
With not a taste of good.
In the dust they lie down together,
And worms cover them both.
Indeed I know your thoughts
And the violence you do to reasoning to bear me down.
For you say, Where is the house of the notable?,
Where is the tent in which the wicked dwelt?
Have you not asked those who travel the road?
Do you not accept their evidence
291
292
30.
That the wicked is kept in the day of disaster,

Is guaranteed19 in the day of wrath?
31.
Who declares his way to his face,

Or requites him for what he has done?
20But he is borne to the tombs,
Having provided his own elegy, with ute and pipe,21
And after him all men will walk in long procession,
And all who go before him are innumerable,
And watch is kept over his tomb.
How then will you offer me vain comfort?
And your answers amount to nothing but deceit?
32a.
33a.
33b.
33c.
32b.
34.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
sing. tal, if correct, would indicate that Job turns from the friends who are
addressed before and after the verb to Zophar, the last speaker; but after LXX, Sym.,
S and V the plural should probably be read.
Conjecturing leeddm for MT lem.
Reading Niphal hiamm for the Hiphil MT hamm.
Reading mem for MT immm, and taking it with 8b metri causa.
Reading rm with LXX and V for MT r in agreement with the plurals in the
context, m being corrupted to w in the Old Heb. script.
Reading prm with LXX and V for MT pr, assuming the same scribal error as
in MT r.
Reading yr for MT yie. As the parallel yime indicates, y (rejoice)
would also be apt, but the corruption of yr to yie is graphically more natural.
Reading yeall with the versions and Qere for MT yeall.
Reading with Sym., S, T and V y, from Aram. neha for MT ytt.
Reading irea for MT erea.
The couplet is possibly a later addendum.
Reading mimmenn (from him, sc. God) with LXX for MT menn, assuming
haplography of m and the corruption of nal w to y at the stage of development of
the script represented by the Qumran MSS.
Reading n for MT nyw (conjecture). See Commentary ad loc.
Conjecturing yireh (variant of yirweh) for MT yir. See Commentary ad loc.
Conjecturing kadd for MT k. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading with one Heb. MS aann for MT alanan, a scribal error, introducing l in
anticipation of the following lw.
Reading amyw after S for MT anyw assuming corruption of m to n in the Old
Heb. script.
Reading le with LXX, S and V for MT l.
Reading yal for MT yl, nal w being perhaps a dittograph of following m in
the Old Heb. script, or to be attached as conjunction to the following m. See Commentary ad loc.
On the arrangement of the text of vv. 32-33 see Commentary ad loc.
Conjecturing miqnn-l be waall for MT meq-l rige nal. See
Commentary ad loc.
MT
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293
2. In tanmem the pronominal sufx is subjective.
3. MT tal would refer specically to Jobs reply to Zophars speech in ch.
20. But his citation of instances of the downfall of the ungodly from their
prosperity and power is also the theme of the categorical statements of Eliphaz
(15.20ff.) and Bildad (18.5ff.). With reference to their facile dismissal of him
as a windbag full of foolish notions (8.2; 11.3; 15.2), the plur. of the verb must
have been the original reading (so LXX, Sym., S and V), in agreement with the
verbs in the rest of the strophe.
4. n is used proleptically with the pronominal sufx in (my complaint) for emphasis (GKC, 143a). MT m, meaning that Jobs complaint
is not to humans, implies that it is to God and is therefore beyond the scope of
the limited wisdom of his friends, which is exposed in the sequel. But in the
context of v. 4b MT lem is probably a Masoretic misunderstanding of
leeddm from dmm (Am I to be silent in respect of my complaint?), where
le would be the asseverative enclitic, or it might rather introduce the imperfect
after (is my complaint such that I may keep silence?), which we prefer.
In any case this reading best suits the context of v. 4b.
tiqar r (lit. my spirit is short) expresses impatience; cf. wattiqar
nee hm, of Israel in the wilderness (Num. 21.4) and of Samson nagged
by Delilah (Judg. 16.6). The phrase describes destitution in the Ugaritic
Legend of Keret (Gordon UT 127, 34, 47), where it denotes persons at the
limit of their endurance.
5. In MT haamm the Hiphil of mam might denote the entering into a
certain condition (GKC, 53d). But we prefer to read the Niphal reexive (so
Hlscher, Fohrer). The laying of the hand on the mouth symbolized silence
(cf. 29.9; 40.4; Judg. 18.19; Mic. 7.16; Prov. 30.32), or deference. In Egyptian
legal convention it signied that a litigant desisted from his case; cf. Ball on
29.9. Dahood (1962: 64) suggests that the gesture may express astonishment,
citing the seal with one marvelling at the ight of Etana on the eagle (ANEP,
pl. 695).
7. eq has an Arab. cognate meaning, as in Heb. to grow old, but a homonym means to thrive. The verb is probably used here in the latter sense but
with a double entendre, the former being suggested by yiy in v. 7a and the
latter in the complementary ger ayil in v. 7b.
8. Our reading mem for MT immm (with them) is supported by the
parallel nn (established) in v. 8a (so Ball, Dhorme).
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9. In batthem lm, lm may be used adverbially as in 5.24, lm

ohole. LXX and V render it as a verb, and S as a participle, which might
indicate a reading lem (so Siegfried, Duhm) or perhaps elwm (from
lw), secure (so Houbigant).
10. In MT r ibbar wel yl, T, Rashi and Qimchi understand ibbar to
refer to the passing of the semen properly without mishap (soiling, yl, in
the sense the verb has in Aram.). Alternatively, with this sense of ibbar in
view, the word may be translated more broadly as engender, impregnate, as
in Aram. and Late Heb. and gal may mean, as generally in Heb., to show
aversion. Perhaps ar should be read and gual meaning respectively
mount and be rejected. In the sense of giving birth pill is used in the OT
only here and at 39.3, where it is used in the Aram. Targum from Qumran. In
23.7b it means to bring off a case. For the Piel of l (to be bereaved or
barren) meaning to abort, cf. Gen. 31.18; Exod. 23.26.
11. On wl (child) and its possible derivation, see on 19.18. The comparison of the skipping children to lambs, using the same verb rqa, recalls Ps.
29.6, where the quaking of mountains is compared to the skipping of calves.
The same verb describes the motion of locusts in Joel 2.5, presumably when
the young insects hop on the ground before taking ight.
12. On the reading yr (they sing) for MT yie (they raise), see Textual
Note. If MT is correct, voice must be understood, which is actually possible
(cf. Isa. 42.11), but somewhat colourless in the context. For ke, LXX, V, S
and T seem to have read be, but MT may be retained in the sense of according to, that is to the accompaniment of. The mention of the timbrel (t) and
the stringed lyre (kinnr) indicates that denotes a wind instrument, a
kind of ute according to T.
13. On the reading yeall (Qere), y and irea (and in peace), see
Textual Notes. The verb ra is found in the Niphal of a sword returned to its
sheath (Jer. 47.6) and in the Hiphil meaning to give rest (Jer. 31.2; 50.34;
Isa. 51.4; Deut. 28.15; etc.); cf. Arab. rajaa, to return, sc. to rest after action.
Again the Book of Job is emphatic. Death closes all accounts, without reward
or punishment.
14. In l n, the verb, which means usually in Heb. to take pleasure in,
means rather to care about; cf. Sym. (zealous) and Arab. aa
meaning in the IIIrd Form to observe carefully.
15. mah-adday k-naaeenn recalls the passage in the Ugaritic text
Gordon UT Krt, 39: mat krt kybky (Who is Krt that he weeps?), cited by
Dahood (1963c: 60).
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295
16-19. This passage in MT, asserting the traditional doctrine of the theodicy,
has been taken, either wholly or partly, as an orthodox gloss. Siegfried so
regarded vv. 16-18; cf. Budde, Hlscher, Stevenson. Stevenson suggested that
v. 16 may continue the deant words of the wicked in 15 and proposed the
emendation hal eyn n.
16. rem supports the 3rd person pronominal sufxes in MT. Stevenson
proposed to omit rem and read an, giving the meshing of v. 16b our
purpose is far beyond him. rem may in this case have been a dittograph of
the same word in v. 17a, but we would retain MT as an orthodox gloss, introduced by hn (See). Verses 17-19 then follow as Jobs questioning of the
conventional belief in retribution, if not of the sinner (vv. 17-18), then of his
sons (v. 19).
17. Jobs indignant question, How often is the lamp of the wicked put out?,
is a citation of Bildads assertion in 18.5, which in turn recalls the gurative
statement in Prov. 13.9; 24.20. In v. 17c, alm yeallq beapp (LXX pains
shall seize them because of his anger) suggests a reading yaazqm for MT
yeallq. LXX probably misunderstood alm, which, Friedrich Delitzsch
suggested, was a cognate of Akk. ablu (to destroy) with cognates in Aram.,
Syr. and Late Hebrew (so Hlscher, Stevenson), giving the sense he metes out
destruction in his wrath. Alternatively Dhorme regards elm as malefactors as in Ass. and yeallq as meaning he destroys (cf. Ass. alqu), giving
the translation He destroys malefactors in his wrath. The odd colon with the
change of subject indicates a gloss.
18. Both teen (chopped straw) and m (chaff) are winnowed from the
heavier grain on the threshing-oor, when the peasant in Palestine took the
advantage of the evening breeze. teen, lighter than grain but heavier than
m, falls at some distance from the grain and is used as fodder; m being
carried clean away. The gure is a common one in the OT describing the total
discomture of an enemy (Isa. 29.5) and specically, as here, of the wicked;
cf. Ps. 1.4; 35.5. In v. 18b genatt sh is a relative clause with the relative
particle omitted as often in poetry. gna, regularly to steal, means also to
snatch away surreptitiously; cf. 27.20, also with sh as subject, and also the
eighth commandment (Exod. 20.15; Deut. 5.19; Gen. 40.15; Deut. 24.7),
where the verb means to kidnap (Alt 1953).
19. Rashi and Jewish exegesis take v. 19a as Jobs citation of the argument of
current orthodoxy. Verse 19b is Jobs reply to the argument of orthodoxy
which he has just cited. In v. 19a there may be a double entendre. Without
elah as subject, n might be understood as substance which a man stores
up for his sons; with elah as subject it means that God stores up the trouble a
wicked man incurs for his sons.
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20. In MT k may be a hapax legomenon, which none of the versions or

commentators recognizes. The original may be d, as Rashi supposed, or
possibly, and more likely, p, a corruption having occurred in the square
script. p (disaster) is well attested in Job (e.g. 12.5; 15.23). Dahood (1957:
316) has proposed that kadd (his agon) should be read for MT k. k in
Gen. 24.14ff. and Judg. 7.16 denotes a water-jar and in 1 Kgs 17.13f. a container for meal, but in the Ras Shamra texts it denotes a large liquid measure
or container, like a agon. The parallel colon indicates that drinking is
involved, which suggests that MT yir might be a corruption, or perhaps a
byform, of yirweh (let him drink his ll). The conception of drinking the
wrath of the Almighty reects the image of the cup of the Lords fury from
which the nations must drink in his judgment (e.g. Isa. 51.17, 22; Jer. 23.15).
MT enw, read as singular n (lit. his eye) in the context, means the man
himself; cf. Arab. hwa aynuhu (the very man), which obviates any reference in the verb to seeing rather than drinking ones ll. Jobs argument is
that the doctrine of the theodicy would be more convincing if the malefactor
himself were liable to retribution.
21. The verb here means interest, concern rather than take pleasure
in, reecting the nuance of the Syr. cognate and particularly Arab. aa,
meaning in the IIIrd Form to observe carefully. The reading u is well
attested in the ancient versions except S, being restored in Origens recension
of LXX from Theod. Aq. with his usual literalism renders was halved. Theod.
and V read was cut short, for which Dhorme cites the support of Ass. au
(so Hlscher). T and S on the other hand read have been assigned, which
perhaps indicates a reading ra, proposed by Ewald; cf. 14.5a im arm
ymyw, since his days are determined. The sequel to this passage might
rather suggest uqqq have been appointed, decreed, which would be closer
to MT in the Old Heb. script. But there is no need to emend since the verb may
be cognate with Arab. aa, to assign exclusively to (so G.R. Driver 1955:
83).
22. This verse is taken as a gloss by G.B. Gray, Stevenson, Tur-Sinai; cf.
Pope, who observes that it is more appropriate to Jobs friends. He treats it as
the end of the citation of the orthodox opinions in vv. 19-21. Fohrer, who pays
great attention to strophic arrangement, takes it as the conclusion of this
strophe, where it serves as rebuke to those who would circumscribe God by a
strict law of retribution. This is of course the nal answer of the Book, but Job
does not reach it so easily and certainly not at this stage. It may rather be
another citation expressing Jobs criticism of his friends limitation of Gods
justice to the convention of human society, which he goes on further to
criticize in the light of empirical experience in vv. 23-26, to which verses we
regard it as the introduction. This couplet in its original context outside the
Book of Job may reect the sapiential tradition which aimed at adapting
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297
humanity to the situation as it was under the divine economy, in which

humans may impose their own conditions and moral judgment. yelamm is
in the 3rd person of the indenite subject.
rmm is formally ambiguous. It is taken in T to mean heavens (cf. Ps.
78.69), but the verb yip indicates a personal object exalted ones, the
celestial ministers of God, who are subject to his correction (cf. 4.18; 15.15;
Ps. 82.1). Here the signicance of the verb is in its primary sense to rule,
govern, as in the Ras Shamra texts, where the participle p is parallel to mlk
(king, Gordon UT 51, IV, 44; nt, V, 40) and to zbl prince (Gordon UT
68.15, 16f.; 22, 25). Judgment, which consisted in assessing a persons conduct
in conformity with established government and bringing it into conformity, is
a secondary meaning.
23. eem, lit. bone, means here the essence; cf. eem with pronominal
sufxes signifying oneself, etc.
MT alanan is a scribal error for aann under the inuence of MT lew
in v. 23b, which is a scribal error for the sing. lw through dittography at the
stage of the development of the alphabet illustrated in the Qumran MSS.
24. For the hapax legomenon anyw Dillman conjectured the meaning
pails, citing Heb. maan (oil-vat) (so Budde, Duhm, G.B. Gray). The
versions render the word as parts of the body parallel to his bones in v. 24b,
for example, entrails (LXX, V), breasts (T), sides (S). The word is probably a corruption in the Old Heb. script of amyw (his thighs), known in
Aram. and Syr. (so Bochart, Klostermann, Ehrlich, Tur-Sinai, Hlscher,
Stevenson, Fohrer, Pope, Terrien). Agreeable with this reading and the parallel
in v. 24b, le (fat) must be read for MT l (milk). ma is a hapax
legomenon in the OT, but mm is found parallel and complementary to
emnm (fat) in Isa. 25.6, of fat burnt-offerings in Ps. 66.15 and fatlings in
Isa. 5.17. le is supported by LXX, V and S. qh is attested in the OT only
in the Hiphil (to give to drink) and here in the Pual. The specic sense of
moisture, or freshness, to the marrow of the bones reveals iqqy leaem
(Prov. 3.8).
25. be in al bah has a partitive signicance; cf. b with the sense of
Heb. min in Ugaritic.
26. It is not easy, if indeed possible, to determine whether rimmh here means
worms (collective sing.) as the parallel tla in Isa. 14.11 and Job 25.6
indicates, or decay, corruption; cf. Arab. rimmatu(n).
27. mezimm is ambiguous, meaning either reason, discrimination (Prov.
1.4) or, more often, sinister thoughts or devices (Pss. 10.2; 21.12; 37.1; Jer.
11.15; Prov. 12.2; 24.8), in many cases, as here, parallel to mae.
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29. It has been assumed that ber ere were travelling merchants in caravans, and that their signs () were not arguments or proofs, as Dillmann,
Budde, Duhm, S.R. Driver and G.B. Gray assume, nor reminiscences of
deliverance in straits (so Hlscher), but grafti such as are known in Sinai and
the Hejaz (so Dhorme), recalling deliverance from the hazards of the way.
Fohrer, on the other hand, would see a reference to the reminiscences of any
who had any breadth of experience in the world or even any passerby, as in
Pss. 80.13 (EVV 12); 89.42 (EVV 41); Lam. 1.12; Prov. 9.13. The association
with the day of wrath (v. 30a) might seem inconsistent with the hazards of
wayfarers, though they too were in peril of natural disasters (cf. 20.28).
30. For MT yl, for which in any case the masc. sing. should be read, the
general sense and the parallel in v. 30a suggested the emendation to yual
(rescued) to Dillman, Graetz, Beer and Hlscher, while Fohrer reads yal
nearer MT in the square script, citing the verb used of Jacob coming through
his encounter at the Jabbok and prevailing (Gen. 32.31). This verb, however,
which we nd acceptable, may rather be cognate with Arab. wakala (to
appoint a trustee, waklu[n]), of the Arab. invocation allhu wakl.
31. The implication of al-pnyw may be that no one can dare to convict the
prosperous sinner in his despite; cf. al-pnay in the rst commandment in
the Decalogue (Exod. 20.3; Deut. 5.7); so E. Knig.
32-33. The sequence of the action indicates that the text of MT is disarranged.
The meaning of the various cola apposite to the theme is in no doubt, with the
notable exception of v. 33a, meq-l rie naal (sweet to him are the
clods of the valley), which we nd meaningless and incongruous with the
context. After much consideration our rst attempt to recover the sense of the
colon was to take the verb in its literal sense, the only possible one in Heb., and
read meq-l z nal (sweet to him are the honey-ows, lit. secretions
of bees), involving no emendation but the assumption of the corruption of z to
r (doubtful) and w to g in the square script. If this were the original it would
refer to grave-offerings of food, actually attested in Israel in Samaria in the
Israelite period (Sukenik 1945: 42-58). If this were accepted it would indicate
a displacement from after the actual burial in v. 33bc. But we doubt this
meaning of naal, which is certainly Arabic, but not attested in Heb., Aram. or
Syr. We would therefore suggest that the colon should read:
miqnn-l be well
Having provided for his own elegy, with ute and pipe.
Admittedly, this is further from MT, with the graphic difculty of the assumption of the omission of such a distinctive letter as in any Heb. script. In an
obviously corrupt text, however, after initial corruption the text is liable to
more extensive damage. We would therefore suggest that v. 32a notes the
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taking of the corpse for burial, v. 33a the elegy (qnh) for the defunct, with
musical accompaniment, v. 33bc describes the cortege, naturally preceded by
the professional mourners, while v. 32b refers to the watch posted over the
grave. We take miqnn as the Hithpael of qnn (to declare an elegy,
qnh) in the reexive sense, and would emphasize l; the rich sinner has had
his own elegy prepared for him. The classical example of such an elegy,
introduced by both noun (qnh) and verb (wayeqnn), is Davids elegy for
Saul and Jonathan (2 Sam. 1.19ff.), which is both elegy and eulogy (vv. 2224). We may be sure that, in the elegy which the ourishing sinner had had
prepared for himself and duly edited, the element of panegyric was not
lacking. The elegy in regular meter and sung or chanted may well have been
accompanied by music, the plaintive wind-instruments, , used on a
happier occasion in v. 12, and the pipe (ll), which could easily be handled
in processions, as in the procession from Gihon after Solomons anointing
(1 Kgs 1.40).
32a. The plural qer may denote a family burial-ground or it may be a
pluralis excellentiae signifying conspicuous tombs of notables, as the rockhewn tombs of the family of Tobiah (Neh. 6.1) at Iraq al-Amir east of the
Jordan and northeast of Jericho in the Persian period, when the Book of Job
was produced. The verb yal is used with qeer in 10.19.
33bc. Buttenwieser cites a late Egyptian text which contrasts the cortege of a
rich man with the burial of a poor man carried out on a reed mat with not a
man on earth walking after him.
33b. ma, here intransitive, recalls the intransitive verb ma in Judg. 4.6,
describing the march of the men of Zebulun and Naphtali to Tabor in Baraks
campaign, meaning, however, in that case, we believe, in small staggered
parties (so long drawn-out) to evade suspicion.
32b. g is found in the OT meaning a heap of sheaves (5.26; Exod. 22.5;
Judg. 15.5). Here, reading possibly ga from gee, it signies grave-mound,
cf. Aram. gea (to heap up) and more specically Arab. jadau(n) (gravemound). In the verb qa (to be wakeful, hence watchful), Dhorme
suggests a reference to the statue or symbol of the presence of the defunct, like
the obelisks above the rock-hewn tombs of Petra, watching over his tomb (so
Merx, Budde and Duhm, who read the plural, and Hlscher, who reads
yiq). But we prefer to retain yiq, the subject being indenite, the
implication being that there are grave-goods worth plundering. Hlscher and
Fohrer think rather of the service to the dead, for example, drink-offerings and
the like, citing eqh in caring for (cattle) in Ben Sira 38.26, where, however, the parallel with attention indicates that the meaning is rather
alertness in providing the fodder.
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34. heel means breath, vapour, as, for example, in Isa. 57.13 and Eccl.
1.14; 2.15; etc. where it is parallel to ra in the sense of wind. Figuratively
it means that which is insubstantial and elusive as, for example, in Jer. 10.15;
51.18, where it is parallel to eqer (deceit). In the present passage it is used
adverbially. maal usually denotes treachery or deceit. It refers to the
friends deluding themselves by blinking off facts and setting Job in a false
light.
Job 22
ELIPHAZS STATEMENT
On our rejection of a third round of debate involving Jobs intensied appeals

for a legal confrontation with God (ch. 23; 26.1-4; 27.1-6, 11-12) in response
to Eliphazs indictment (22.6-9) and culminating in Jobs apologia pro vita
sua (ch. 29), the statement of his ruin (ch. 30) and his great oath of purgation
(ch. 31), see above, pp. 59-61. This direct personal matter in the forensic
idiom we distinguish on grounds of matter and form from secondary intrusions
of sapiential poems (ch. 24; 26.5-14; 27.7-10, 11-15; ch. 28). Chapter 25,
attributed, possibly secondarily, to Bildad, falls into the hymnal category.
Eliphazs statement falls into two parts: vv. 3-20, which asserts the orthodox belief in the theodicy, and vv. 21-30, where Job is exhorted to humility
and repentance, and consequent blessing is promised. The address is divided
into six strophes (vv. 2-5, 6-9, 10-14, 15-20, 21-26, 27-30). The literary afnity
of the rst strophe (vv. 2-5), where Eliphaz takes up the debate by citing Jobs
statement (21.15) that a persons goodness or wickedness can neither prot
nor harm God, is with a sapiential controversy. The statement that virtue
prots the good person (v. 2b) is characteristic of the wisdom of Proverbs, and
from the standpoint that Jobs suffering implies sin (v. 4) the second strophe
(vv. 6-9) arraigns the sinner. Here Job seems to be accused of the most blatant
sins, which could not possibly have escaped notice, and were certainly not
suspected by Eliphaz in his rst speech, where it is recalled that Job had been
a pillar of society (4.3ff.). That such an indictment was made, and especially
by the most sympathetic and mature of Jobs friends, is surely designed to
afford Job the opportunity to answer the charges, anticipating his apologia
(ch. 29) and his oath of purgation (ch. 31). The alleged sins are signicantly
against the poor and weak, of which a man of Jobs status and prosperity may
have been guilty, albeit by omission. Formally, the cumulative indictment of
sin followed by the announcement of doom in vv. 10-11 introduced by al-kn
(therefore) is familiar in Hebrew tradition in prophetic address. Actually the
passage on sin and retribution (vv. 5-11) and that on obedience to God and
consequent prosperity (vv. 21-26), which is introduced by an imperative (with
conditional signicance), are expanded in conditional sentences. In the third
strophe (vv. 10-14), v. 12, on Gods exaltation is probably a gloss on v. 13
since it breaks the argument between vv. 11 and 14 and is pointless to the
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Job 22. Eliphazs Statement
argument of Eliphaz here and is not included in the citation of Jobs argument
in vv. 13-14. Eliphaz follows the prophetic line of argument from sin in vv. 69 to retribution in vv. 10-11, facts of experience which refute Jobs argument
in vv. 13-14. This theme and the citation of the view which is to be refuted is
familiar in sapiential dialectic and is paralleled in wisdom psalms (e.g. 73.11;
94.7). In the fourth strophe (vv. 15-20), in the form of a question, a warning is
given, based on the downfall of the ungodly, with an assurance to the
righteous. In the sapiential tradition that is familiar in the exhortation of a sage
to his disciples.
In the second part of Eliphazs address the bulk of the rst strophe, the fth
in the chapter (vv. 21-26), is occupied with exhortation to return and reach
agreement with God, and the second, the sixth in the chapter (vv. 27-30), with
the assurance of consequent blessings. This had its literary counterpart in preexilic prophecy (e.g. Amos 5.14-15; Isa. 1.18-20; Hos. 6.1-3), and was also at
home in the wisdom tradition in the exhortation of the sages. The passage ends
with two couplets, vv. 29 and 30, assuring the innocent one who is humbly
dependent on God and thereby asserting faith in the theodicy.
The text is almost certainly extended by later glosses, for example in v. 12
(see above) and vv. 17-18, which is probably prompted by 21.14-16. Verses
24-25, which exhort people to count their gold as pebbles of the wadis and
accept the Almighty as their treasure, is a strange gure which interrupts the
sapiential argument in the fth strophe and is probably a later gloss; its
removal reduces the strophe to more regular proportions and strengthens the
argument.
Eliphazs opening question makes God independent of any advantage from
humans (v. 21), whose good conduct as the wisdom tradition insists, benets
himself (v. 2b), just, as we may infer, the sin of the wicked bears the seeds of
their own destruction (15.20ff.; 18.6-14). Or, we may say, a good person has
the responsibility, if not also the potential, to full oneself. Eliphaz emphasizes Gods independence of the best a human can offer by a gure from commerce. The blameless conduct of humans is not gratefully received as a prot
to God (v. 3). Asking the rhetorical question, which is tantamount to a strong
denial, Would he reprove you for your piety towards him?, Eliphaz
concludes, as in his opening address (4.8f.; 5.6), that suffering betokens sin,
with which he now charges Job directly and specically (v. 5). His particular
indictment (vv. 6-9) is signicantly limited to treatment of the underprivileged
and contains mainly sins of omission. They relate therefore to Jobs status and
wealth, which have certain social obligations, noblesse oblige, as Job recognizes in his apologia (v. 29) in the prelude to his great oath of purgation. In
Eliphazs indictment there is the recognition that such prestige and afuence
as Job had enjoyed has its peculiar dangers. The subject, himself free from
poverty and not understanding its stresses, may be less than sympathetic to
those in need (vv. 7, 9a). In certain cases his sins seem to be sins of commission rather than sins of omission, such as stripping the poor of clothing
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(v. 6a) and breaking the arms of orphans (v. 9b). But this may simply mean
neglecting to give an orphan a chance to maintain himself, while stripping the
poor of clothing and taking pledges (cf. Amos 2.8) where there was no actual
need (v. 6b), both probably refer to taking pledges, which was a legal right
indeed but might well have been waived by Job. The imputation of Gods
transcendence and consequent aloofness to human conduct (vv. 13f.) is a more
serious charge, where the argument of Job in 9.4-10 is cited (vv. 13f.). This,
Eliphaz concludes, would explain Jobs calamity, which he guratively
describes as snares, sudden terrors, darkening of his light and ood (vv.
10-11), citing the language and aphorisms that colour the depiction of the fate
of the wicked in the addresses of Bildad and Zophar (18.5, 6, 8-10; 19.28),
with particular reference to Jobs demolition of their case (ch. 21).
Eliphazs indictment concludes with the sapiential warning of the danger of
pursuing the way of the wicked, sudden death and overwhelming ood (15f.)
again reecting the admonitions of Jobs friends. This consideration of the
social order which faith and wisdom upheld is conrmed, as in the Plaint of
the Sufferer and Wisdom Psalms (e.g. Ps. 58.11ff. [EVV 10f.]), by the recognition of retribution by the righteous, not without manifest satisfaction and
indeed unholy glee (vv. 19-20).
Eliphazs nal word to Job (vv. 21-26) ends, as his rst address (5.8-26),
with encouragement to reconciliation with God and humble obedience (v. 25;
cf. 5.8 and hope of rehabilitation (v. 26; cf. 5.16a, 18-26).
Chapter 22
1.
Then answered Eliphaz the Temanite:
2.
Can a man bring prot to God?

Nay, but the wise man simply prots himself.
If you are right does the Almighty receive it with pleasure?
Or is there any gain to him in your blameless conduct?
Is it for your piety towards him that he reproves you?
Could he come into court with you?
Is not your wickedness great,
And your iniquities endless?
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
For you have exacted pledges of your brothers where there was no need,
And stripped the naked of their clothing.
You have not given a drink of water to the weary,
And from the weary you have withheld bread.
The land was for the man of strong arm,
And the favoured man was settled in it.
You have sent widows away empty-handed,
And have broken1 the arm of orphans.
Therefore snares are round about you,
And sudden terror confounds you.
304
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.

Your light2 is darkened so that you cannot see,
And a ood of waters covers you.
3Is not God the height of the heavens themselves?
See the highest stars, how exalted they are!
Yet you say, What does God know?
Can He exercise judgment through the deep darkness?
The clouds hide Him so that he does not see,
And the vault of heaven is His beat.
Will you keep to the way of the wicked,4
Which men of sin have trodden,
Who were snatched away untimely,
Their foundations dissolved in a ood?
5
They said to God, Away from us!
Yea, what can the Almighty do to us?6
Yet it was he who had lled their houses with good things,
But the purpose of the wicked is remote from Him.7
The righteous see it and are glad,
And the innocent laughs at them.
Is not their substance8 wiped out,
And their abundance consumed by re?
Be accommodating with Him and in accord,
Thereby is the way to happiness.
Accept direction from His mouth,
And lay up His words in your heart.
If you humbly9 turn to the Almighty,
If you remove iniquity from your tent,
10
And rate11 your ne gold as12 dust,
And gold of Ophir as the pebbles of the wadis,
And the Almighty becomes your gold ingots,
And your silver in heaps,
Then you will nd your condence in the Almighty,
And shall lift up your face to God.
You will make petition to him and he will hear you,
And you shall have reason to pay your vows.
And you will decide on a matter and it will be established for you,
And light will shine on your ways,
For he humbles13 him14 whose look is haughty,14
But the man whose eyes are lowly he delivers.
He even15 scours an unclean man,
And he will be delivered with his hands clean.16
Textual Notes Chapter 22

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
1
Reading teakk with LXX, V, S, T for MT yeukke, which lacks agreement.

Reading re a with LXX for MT -e.
The whole verse is probably a gloss. See Introduction to ch. 22.
Reading awlm, possibly written originally in scriptio defectiva, for MT lm.
Verses 17-18 are probably a gloss. See Introduction to ch. 22.
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6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
305
Reading ln with LXX and S for MT lm, n being corrupted to m in the Old Heb.
script.
Reading mimmenn for MT menn. See on Textual Note 12 to ch. 21.
Reading yeqmm with Theod. for MT qmn, assuming corruption of nal m for n
in the Old Heb. script, and the metathesis of y and q. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading tneh with LXX for MT tibbneh.
Verses 24-25 are probably. See introduction to ch. 22.
Reading weatt or t for MT , which, however, may possibly be retained as a
perfect passive.
Reading im (of comparison) for MT al.
Reading hipl for MT hipl, taking nal w as a dittograph.
Reading hmr gaawh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading gam yemall metri causa, gam having been omitted by haplography before
ym of yemall in the script at the stage of the Qumran MSS.
Reading kappyw with S and V for MT kapp, w being corrupted to k in the old
Heb. script.
2. san (to care for, do a service to; cf. 15.3) is attested as a synonym of
re (to serve) in 1 Kgs 1.2, 4. k has the adversative sense Nay but.
alm signies on his own account.
3. must be understood as parallel to bea (prot, lit. something broken
off; cf. Gen. 27.26; Ps. 30.10; Mic. 3.14), and if, as seems likely, a gure from
commerce is indicated (so Fohrer), e would correspond to a merchants
Gratefully received! or My pleasure!.
4f. On the signicance of vv. 1-5, see above, p. 301.
6. Brothers must be understood to refer to kinsmen, who merited more
responsible patronage. The sins are introduced by k (because) in v. 6 and
retribution by al-kn in v. 10 reecting prophetic declaration. Dereliction of
social duty is aggravated by the neglect of the obligation that when someones
outer garment is taken as pledge (cf. Amos 2.8) it must be retained before
nightfall (Exod. 22.25-28; Deut. 24.10ff.). Consideration for the poor (v. 6)
and hungry (v. 7), the widow and orphan (v. 9), while a charge on the community, is peculiarly the responsibility of a man of status and substance. Hence
the condemnation of the abuse of power to grab land (v. 8).
8. This colon, not directly addressed to Job, may be an intrusion, perhaps the
citation of a declaration, possibly prophetic, on the monopoly of land, which
ought to have been a communal asset, by force (zera, lit. arm) or by
political favour; cf. the animadversion of the prophets on such acquisition and
monopoly of land (Isa. 5.8).
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ne nm (lit. he who has been lifted up in respect of face) refers
originally to prostration before a superior, who then extended his sceptre and
lifted the face of the one he favoured from the ground.
9. The care of the widow and orphan is frequently recommended in the OT
(Deut. 10.18; 14.29; 16.11, 14; 24.19; 26.12; Isa. 1.17) and the neglect of this
duty duly condemned (Exod. 22.22; Deut. 27.19; Jer. 7.6; Zech. 7.10). This is
cited as the normal duty of a king in the Canaanite legends of Aqht and Krt
(Gordon UT 127, 46-50):
ltdn dn almnt
ltp p qr np
ltdy tm l dl
lpnk ltlm ytm
bd kslk almnt
Thou dost not judge the case of the widow,

Nor uphold the suit of the distressed;
Thou dost not drive away the oppressor of the
poor;
Before thee thou dost not feed the fatherless;
The widow is behind thy back.
Breaking the orphans arm may have been hindrance to his efforts to support
himself and his mother.
10. As in Isa. 24.18, pa or paa (trap) is used in juxtaposition with paa,
which means pack (of hunting dogs) as well as terror. Here the emphasis is
on terror, though there may be double entendre, the net being set for the
quarry, which is startled by the pack as in Isa. 24.18. See further on 15.21 and
18.8-10.
11. On the reading re a for MT -e, see Textual Note.
ih (ood) is found again at 38.34. The root apa, with an Aram. and
Syr. cognate meaning to overow, abound, is attested as epa in Deut. 33.19
and iph, meaning a crowd of men (2 Kgs 9.17), horses (Ezek. 26.10),
camels (Isa. 60.6) and, as here, waters.
12. The fact of Gods exaltation, which is cited in Isa. 40.26-27 to encourage
faith in his providential care, may suggest to the sinner that he is transcendent
and beyond all care for human order. For gah, T reads beah and S reads
hibah (he has made high). The abstract the height of the heavens may be
intentional, in apposition to God, but the verse is probably a gloss on v. 13.
14. The circle of the heavens ( mayim) is the horizon where land and
sea according to the ancient conception met in the surrounding sky, which was
depicted as a vault; cf. 26.10, he has described a circle upon the face of the
waters, and Prov. 8.27 and Isa. 40.22, the circle of the earth.
15. In defending MT ra lm (the old way) against the proposed emendation ra awlm (Ball, Tur-Sinai), which has no support in the ancient
versions, Dhorme thought of the ancient sinners the sons of God of old (aer
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mlm), who mated with the daughters of men (Gen. 6.4) and the generation
of the ood. Dahood (1962: 65ff.) makes the more feasible suggestion that the
phrase, reading the abstract lm, means dark path (cf. 42.3 maalm h,
obscuring the purpose), but the parallelism supports the reading awlm in
scriptio defectiva.
16. qumme (were snatched away) is Aram. rather than Heb., being attested
only here and 16.8. Eliphaz again cites Bildads description of the fate of the
wicked.
After the passive yaq (is poured over), yedm may be taken as the
accusative of the objective of the action (GKC, 121d).
17-18. This passage, which interrupts the sequence of thought in vv. 15-16,
19-20, is generally regarded as secondary, possibly inspired by v. 12, which
also is possibly an intrusion; both passages are inuenced by Jobs citation of
the statement of the wicked who ourish (21.14f.).
17. On the reading ln with LXX and S for MT lm, see Textual Note.
18. Reading mimmenn with LXX for MT menn.
20. This verse was not in the original LXX, and was restored by Origen from
Theod. With a slight adjustment, qmn and yirm might be read in the
sense of our enemies and their remnant (so Olshausen, Siegfried, Ball,
Duhm, Stevenson). The versions indicate the sing. of a noun in the former
with the 3rd plur. masc. pronominal sufx in the latter. Theod.s rendering,
their substance (yeqmm; cf. Gen. 7.4, 23; Deut. 11.6so Merx, Graetz,
G.B. Gray, Dhorme, Hlscher, Weiser, Pope, Fohrer), suggests the meaning
abundance for yirm, which may also mean their remainder (so Fohrer,
Rowley). If this were so, the passage would recall the destruction of the
sinners family without survivor in 20.26.
21. hasken-n imm is a rare expression. The Qal of the verb, meaning to
benet, is attested in v. 2 and 15.3, and the Hiphil, meaning to be accustomed, in Num. 22.30 (JE). This may support V to agree with, which is also
implied in S, etew (correspond to). elm has its primary meaning to be
whole, at one, that is in accord. MT tee is evidently a verbal noun,
your coming, with preformative t analogous to verbal nouns such as temrh,
tenh, etc. The ancient versions, however, and some Heb. MSS, attest the
reading tee (your produce) (so Dhorme), but produce in v. 21b
seems out of context. Dillmann, Budde, Hlscher, Stevenson and most modern
commentators read MT (you shall reach).
22. qa (receive) from lqah, is used of receiving the traditional wisdom of
the sages, leqa, a regular technical term in Proverbs and wisdom psalms.
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308
trh is used here in the general sense of revealed direction and not in its
specic sense of law, still less of the Pentateuchal Law.
23. MT tibbneh, you will be rehabilitated, lit. built up (again), would
suggest the apodosis of a conditional sentence, after the protasis im-ta adadday. The apodosis, however, is introduced after an accumulation of protasis
by k-az in v. 26. Thus tibbneh, or more probably its original, is an imperfect
of attendant circumstances like tarq in v. 22b. For MT tibbneh LXX read
humble yourself, which suggests either tikkna (so Merx, Graetz, Siegfried)
or more probably tneh (so Ewald, Dillmann, Beer, Duhm, Oort, Ehrlich,
Dhorme, Fohrer, Terrien). Hlscher notes both, but, while citing tneh rst
in his note, evidently preferred tikkna in his translation beugest dich (so
too Weiser).
24-25. This passage is taken as secondary, interrupting the sequence of
thought in 23.26 (so Fohrer). The abrupt introduction of the striking metaphor
of the Almighty as gold is strange, as is also the imperative in the protasis
of a conditional sentence, though that usage is attested in Heb. (GKC, 11o)
and in Arab. Alternatively weatt may be read. As is an abrupt usage of
the imperative in the protasis after im-t in vv. 23a, it probably indicates
the intrusion of an aphorism from Wisdom.
24. beer (here pausal form ber), parallel to r, sc. gold of Ophir, is
parallel in its plural form to kese (silver) in v. 25; cf. Ps. 68.31. It is a
cognate of Arab. baara (to examine, sc. after testing). Dhorme aptly cites
mir in connection with bn (testing) in Jer. 6.27. On Ophir, the source
of the gold, see on 28.16. In v. 25b it is proposed to emend MT er to
uer, as in certain Heb. MSS. This, however, is to miss a deliberate wordplay between ber (in the category of pebbles, be being beth essentiae) and
beer (ne gold). There is a similar word-play between r (dust) and
r (gold of Ophir). Besides the word-play, the chiastic parallelism may be
noted, giving the passage all the appearance of an intrusive aphorism.
25. Dhorme justly emphasizes the plural in ber and kese t in the
sense of ingots of gold and silver in heaps. t means literally heights
or protuberances (Num. 23.22; 24.8). Bochart proposed that the word, from
the root ya, is a metathetic cognate of Arab. yaa (to be high).
26. k-z at length introduces the apodosis. z is used exactly as Arab. idan
(in that case). tiann here and in the similar colon in 27.10 is rendered by
LXX secheis parrsian (you will have condence); cf. the usual meaning in
Heb., to have pleasure. In 27.10, S renders tekal (trusted). G.R. Driver
(1955: 84) therefore, taking the verb as a metathetic cognate of Arab. ajana
(to tie on a rope, support), translated depend.
1
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309
28. gzar means to decree, here to decide, and is probably an Aramaism.mer here has the nuance of Arab. amru(n) (a matter). The verb qm
(lit. to stand), means to be established as the Hiphil means commonly to
establish.
29. MT is corrupt. The subject of the main verbs in v. 29a, b must be God, and
so the sing. must be read for the plural. gwh (back) is meaningless and has
no parallel. a nayim (the man whose eyes are lowly, lit. the downcast of
eyes) must have a parallel in the original of wattmer gwh. The solution is
suggested by the verb amru in the Canaanite dialect of the local glosses in
the Amarna tablets and in the Ras Shamra texts. In the latter it is found with
the inxed t and the reexive form of the causative meaning to see (Gordon
UT 137.32; nt I, 22). Instances in the OT are noted by Dahood in Pss. 11.1;
29.9; 71.10; 77.9; 94.4; 105.29 (1963b: 295ff.). So, in the present passage, for
MT hipl wattmer gwh we propose hipl hmr geh (he humbles
him whose look is haughty, lit. who looks haughtily), which gives the
desired parallel to but the man whose eyes are lowly he delivers (v. 29b).
Hebrew commonly localizes different emotions in particular organs, for
instance, pride in the eyes (Isa. 2.11; 5.15; 10.12; Pss. 18.28 [EVV 27]; 101.5;
131.1; Prov. 6.17; 30.7).
In Classical Hebrew, is negative (e.g. i, inglorious). Theod., S
and V either ignore MT or read . MT may mean any (cf. Prov. 31.4 and
Arab. ayyu), hence nq may mean any innocent man. But in the context
we prefer to read as a negative. The recurrence of the verb mla in the
couplet is suspicious and surely indicates a word-play. We accordingly take
the rst yemall as cognate with Arab. malaa (to scour), which suggests
that nq means unclean. The assertion that God will scour the unclean man
who turns humbly to him directly contradicts Jobs assertion that even if he
has been at pains to cleanse himself, God will resume him into lth (9.30-31).
In agreement with the 3rd sing. masc. nimla, MT kapp may be emended to
kappyw, which involves only the reading w for k, which are easily confused
in the Old Hebraic script.
Job 23
JOBS RESPONSE TO ELIPHAZ:
HIS ARDENT DESIRE FOR CONFRONTATION WITH GOD
Chapter 23 consists of three strophes: vv. 2-7, 8-12, 13-17. The rst (vv. 2-7)
is in the forensic form of an appeal for a confrontation with ones opponent in
open court; the second (vv. 8-12) elaborates the theme of the inaccessibility of
God for such a confrontation and is otherwise cast in the legal form of an
assertion of innocence; the last strophe (vv. 13-17) is in the form of a hymn
praising Gods sovereignty, omnipotence and awful majesty, but is adapted to
the theme of the second strophe, the inaccessibility of God, whose will is
arbitrary and whose majesty simply confounds humanity.
Here the drama moves near to its climax. Job is condent that, if confronted
by God, he would be able to put his case with such condence in his ability
(vv. 4f.) and assurance of his innocence (v. 7) that God would have to take it
seriously (v. 6b) and by the divine response Job might know the charge to
answer (v. 5b). He is all too conscious of the transcendence of God (vv. 8-9),
but he has also faith that God who is transcendent is also omniscient and
indeed knows the intimate way of life of his obedient servant (v. 10), which
Job species in the wisdom tradition expressed in Ps. 119.3, 13, 15, 19, 72, 88,
101, as the faithful keeping of Gods commandments and storing up the
words of his mouth (v. 8). But despite his condence in the justice of his case,
which he questions if divine justice could gainsay, a confrontation with God is
still a wish rather than a certainty. Jobs statement signicantly begins with his
resentment at the heavy hand of God on the innocent (v. 2) and the consciousness of the inaccessibility of God (v. 3), which recurs at vv. 6-9,
expresses his appalment at Gods awful determinism (vv. 13-16), but ends
with the subjects determination not to be silenced before the dark mystery
which veils God (v. 17).
Chapter 23
1.
2.
Still is my complaint resentful;1

His hand2 is heavy despite my groaning.
Oh that I knew where I might nd Him,
That I might come to His seat!
3.
1
The Book of Job

4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
311
I should state my case3 before Him,

And ll my mouth with arguments.
I should know with what words He would answer me,
And understand what He should say to me.
Would His great power be (sufcient) in his contention with me?
No! He himself would have to give heed to me.
In that case He would have an upright man to reason with,
And I should bring off my case4 completely.
If I go east, He is not there,
And west, I cannot perceive Him.
When I turn5 north, I do not see him,6
I turn7 south, but do not behold Him.8
But he knows my intimate way,
Were he to test me I should come forth as gold.
My foot has held fast to his steps,9
I have kept to course without swerving;
I have not departed10 from the commandments11 of His lips,
I have stored up the words of His mouth in my bosom.12
But if He chooses13 who can turn Him?
What He himself desires that He does,
For He will complete what He has decreed,14
And many such things are in His mind.
Therefore His presence confounds me,
When I consider Him I am terried of Him.
Yea, God has unmanned me,
And the Almighty has confounded me.
Yet I am not silenced by His obscurity,15
And by his presence16 covered by thick darkness.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
1
Reading mr with S, T and V for MT mer (rebellion).

Reading y with LXX and S for MT y.
Reading mip with LXX for MT mip, y being omitted by haplography before
following w in the script at the stage of its development in the Qumran MSS.
Reading mip with LXX, S, V and many Heb. MSS for MT mie.
Reading baa for MT baa, assuming corruption to y to w in the square script
as at Qumran.
Reading eezh for MT az.
Reading ee for MT yaa. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading erh for MT ereh assuming scriptio defectiva.
Reading baauryw with LXX and S for MT baaur.
Reading l m with LXX, V and many Heb. MSS for MT wel m.
Reading mimmiw with LXX and V for MT miwa.
Reading beq with LXX and V for MT muqq.
Reading bar for MT bee.
Reading uqq with S and V for MT uqq, w being corrupted to y in the script as in
the Qumran MSS.
Reading ok for MT e, assuming omission of w after k in the Old Heb. script.
312
Job 23. Jobs Response to Eliphaz
16. Reading mippnyw for MT mippnay, assuming omission of w by haplography

after y in the script represented by the Qumran MSS.
2. See Textual Note. In support of the reading cf. 7.11, h bemar
na, and 10.1, adabberh bemar na. MT mer, if correct, would mean
rebellion in the sense of resentment, which may also be conveyed by mar.
3. As indicated by m-yittn, yat is an optative perfect, regular in Arab.
teknh (lit. emplacement) denotes seat; cf. hn m in 29.7; Ps. 103.19
(so Jerome, Sym., T and S).
4. On ra (lit. to arrange in order, and specically to draw up a case
[mi]), see on 13.18. On t, here arguments, see on 5.17. The cohortatives without conjunctions in vv. 4 and 5a are tantamount to protasis in a
conditional sentence to which v. 6a is the apodosis (GKC, 108a, f).
6. None of the ancient versions supports MT yim, for which Dhorme and
Graetz read yima (would hear) and Duhm ym l (would heed). But
m is used in this sense with l understood in Isa. 41.20, so MT may be
retained. Tur-Sinai suggests that ra-ka means attorney or plenipotentiary. But Job is surely pressing that God cannot evade his argument, however
remote he may be, but should answer him personally.
7. m, most familiar in Classical Heb. as meaning there, is used here to
mark the next stage of the argument, like Arab. umma. Ugaritic tm, though
occasionally meaning there, has possibly also the signicance then (e.g.
Gordon UT 124, 4, 6, 8). See further on 35.12. Thus there is no need to assume
an original yimr with Dhorme. The Piel pill, with no apparent object, is
apparently a difculty. It has been suggested that it is intransitive with a
reexive force, na possibly being understood. But this is not otherwise
attested except possibly at 20.20. In both cases, if the sense is reexive the
emendation to the Hiphil could be more natural. In this case, MT mie
(from my judge) would be better emended to mimmip after several Heb.
MSS and LXX, S and V. Alternatively mip (my case) may be read as the
object of the Piel pill in its usual transitive sense. This is the more probable
since God is cited by Job as his adversary at law and not as his judge.
8. hn, meaning if, is an Aramaism.
9. On this meaning of h (turn), cf. 1 Sam. 14.32 as understood by LXX
(ekklith) and probably 1 Kgs 20.40 and Ruth 2.19 and possibly Ugaritic y
(Gordon UT 2 Aqht I.30; G.R. Driver 1950b: 53-55). Tur-Sinai, after D. Yellin
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The Book of Job
313
and I. Eitan, proposes that a is cognate with Arab. awatu(n) (covering), omitting we before the following wel as a dittograph, which might
have support in a in its usual meaning to cover, as Pss. 65.14 (EVV 13)
and 73.6; but the context demands the nite verb in v. 9a, with ee (I
turn) as parallel. a in this sense, so understood by S and V, is not attested
elsewhere in Classical Heb., but has cognates in Syr. and Arab., adduced by
G.R. Driver (1950b: 54) and Guillaume (1963: 115ff.). Verses 8f. have been
regarded as secondary intrusion (so Budde, Duhm, G.B. Gray, Ball, Fohrer),
but Dhorme retains the passage, which may be a parody of Ps. 139.7ff., where
the psalmist declares that wherever he turns he nds God and is found by him.
10. For dere imm (lit. my way with me), LXX and V have simply my
way. S reads my way and my standing, suggesting the reading dark
weome, which Dhorme accepts, citing Ps. 139.2ff. (so too Hlscher).
imm (lit. with me) means something intimate to one, something of which
one is conscious; hence Friedrich Delitzsch proposed that dere imm
meant the way of which I am conscious (cf. Renan my conscience), while
Ewald and Dillmann proposed my usual, characteristic way. The gure of
assaying is familiar in Hebrew Wisdom literature (e.g. Prov. 17.1), Psalms
(e.g. 66.10) and postexilic prophecy (e.g. Isa. 48.10). The way or proper
conduct reects the idiom of Wisdom literature (e.g. Prov. 2.8; Pss. 1.6;
37.34). The specic way of Gods commandments (v. 12) reects the phrase in
the Wisdom Psalm 119.15, 31f.
11-12. See Textual Notes.
13. For MT weh ee, T and V offer and (even) if he is alone, taking be
as beth essentiae. But in this rendering y would be expected. Alternatively, bee might be defended by assuming the hostile sense of be, if he is
against a certain one; cf. Gen. 16.12, y bakkl weya kl b (his hand is
against all and the hand of all is against him). But the parallel indicates that
MT is a corruption of bar (he chooses); so Beer, Duhm, Budde, Oort, G.B.
Gray, Dhorme, Hlscher, Mowinckel, Fohrer, Pope after LXX.
14. On the reading uqq for MT uqq with S and V, see Textual Note.
16. hra libb (lit. has made my heart tender) means unmanned, the heart
being the seat of courage or resolution as well as cognition; cf. nmas l
(courage melted away, Josh. 2.11). The phrase is used parallel to fear in
Deut. 20.3; Isa. 7.4; Jer. 51.46.
17. MT nimatt recalls ma, also used in Aram., Syr. and Arab. meaning to
be quiet, which is understood by S. In this case, MT l may be retained with
k used conversatively, yet I am not put to silence.
1
Job 24
JOBS RESPONSE TO ELIPHAZ (CONTINUED, VV. 1-12),
WITH TWO CITATIONS FROM WISDOM POETRY
(VV. 13-18, 19-25)
Commentators have differed widely on this chapter. It is generally agreed that
the assertion of the condign punishment of the oppressor (vv. 19-25) is not
part of Jobs statement in the intention of the author (so Dhorme and G.B.
Gray). It expresses the theme of Jobs friends, and has been claimed for Bildad
(so Hoffmann, including vv. 13-17, and Barton, who would include vv. 5-8,
but would limit 17ff. to 17-22, 24), and it must be said that the exceptionally
short statement of Bildad in the following ch. 25 seems to demand a supplementation, either from this passage or from what follows ch. 25. As for the
rest, Siegfried regarded vv. 17-24 as a later interpolation asserted to modify
one statement of oppression without redress in vv. 1-12. The unity of vv. 1-18
has been further disputed. Certainly vv. 13-18 seems a self-contained unit, and
has been regarded as an importation (so G.B. Gray and Westermann, who
included in this category vv. 5-8, 10f.). The same view is taken by Duhm and
Fohrer, who would resolve the whole chapter into a number of independent
poems from sapiential circles. Considerations of form-criticism would certainly
suggest some such solution. Verses 1-12 have their prototype in Egyptian
Wisdom literature in the Complaint of the Eloquent Peasant (ANET, 407-10)
and similar works; the formal prototype of vv. 13-18 is the listing of subjects
with common characteristics, as in Prov. 30.15f. (things never satised),
30.18f. (progressive forces which are imperceptible), 30.21-23 (things intolerable), 30.24-28 (things small but effective), 30.29f. (things stately). On the
same formal grounds we may distinguish a sapiential poem on the theodicy in
vv. 19-25, which was probably inserted as a corrective to the satire in vv. 1-12.
From this point until Jobs apologia pro vita sua, culminating in his oath of
purgation (vv. 29-31), we are confronted by the disruption of the former
regularity of sequel of addresses and by a substantial amount of poetic
interpolation, culminating in the poem on Wisdom (ch. 28), so that it is fair to
discern in ch. 24 the beginning of this process. Of the secondary nature of vv.
13-18 and 19-25 we are in no doubt but we regard the case as different in 1-12.
Granted the poetic matter cited in vv. 1-12, which Fohrer would resolve into
series of independent poems (vv. 1-4, 10-12, 22-23, 5-8, in that order, with
1
The Book of Job
315
v. 9 a gloss on v. 3), this is held together by the introduction Why are set
times (of judgment) not xed by the Almighty? (v. 1) and the conclusion
The life-breath of the injured cries out, yet God pays no heed to their prayer.
This is the theme of Jobs complaint so that we have no hesitation in regarding
it as a citation by the author himself to form the conclusion of Jobs statement
in the short ch. 23. We see no compelling reason to differ from the order in MT
except to admit Fohrers view that v. 9 is a secondary elaboration of injustice
to the widow and the destitute in v. 3. The tricolon in v. 12 thematically
concludes the opening question of Gods neglect of redress for the injustice
described in vv. 2-11.
The order in MT of the above sections seems to us to raise no question. The
statement that the needy of the land are all made to hide themselves (v. 4) is
naturally developed in the passage on their furtive nightly depredations from
their refuge in the wilds (vv. 5-6), where their exposure (vv. 7-8) leads to the
statement that, keeping the ocks of others as landless paupers, they are
insufciently clad (v. 10a), hungry while as day-labourers in anothers harvest
(v. 10b), with festering sores, they manipulate the heavy stone oil-press (v.
11a), and thirsty, they tread anothers wine-vats (v. 11b).
Admitting Fohrers bracketing of v. 9 as a gloss or variation on v. 3, we
follow Dhormes arrangement of text between vv. 14 and 17, viz. vv. 14ab,
15ab, 14c, 15c, 16abc, 17ab, but read v. 18acb as the tricolon ending the
passage.
Chapter 24
Jobs Response to Eliphaz
(continued, vv. 1-12), with Two Citations from Wisdom
Poetry (vv. 13-18, 19-25).
1.
2.
3.
9.
4.
5.
6.
Why are set times (of judgment) not xed by the Almighty,
And those who acknowledge Him1 never see his days of reckoning?
The wicked2 remove boundary marks;
They lift ock and shepherd.3
They drive off the ass of the fatherless;
They take the widows ox in pledge;
4
They snatch the orphan from the breast,
They take the suckling5 of the poor in pledge.
They divert the poor from the administration,
And the needy of the land are all made to hide themselves.
As6 wild asses in the wilderness
They go forth at dusk,7
Anxiously seeking what they may snatch in the evening
Since there is no food8 for their children.
In elds by night9 they reap,
They hastily gather the grapes of the vineyard of the wicked;
316
7.
They lie naked10 all night without clothing,

Without covering from the cold.
8.
They are wet with the downpour of the mountains,

And cling to the rocks for want of shelter;
Keeping the ocks,11 they go about without clothing,
And themselves hungry, they carry the sheaves;
With festering sores12 they press olive-oil;
They tread the wine-vats, though they (themselves) are thirsty.
The bowels13 of the dying14 groan,
And the life-breath of the injured cries out,
Yet God pays no heed15 to their prayer.16
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
14c.
15c
16.
17.
18a.
c.
b.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
Job 24. Conclusion to Jobs Statement
There are those who rebel against God,17

They do not recognize his ways,
And will not abide in his paths.
When it is not yet light18 the murderer rises,
To slay the poor and needy;
The eye of the adulterer watches for the twilight,
Saying, No eye will mark me.
And at night the thief ranges,19
Yea, he puts a veil on his face.
In the dark he breaks into houses;
Day is a terror to all of them,20
They are all alike21 strangers to the light,
For the morning is the shadow of death to them,
But they are familiar22 with the destructive works of deep darkness.
Headlong they rush23 from the daylight,24
(Such a one) dare not take the road on the heights,25
His allotted portion26 in the land is cursed.
The drought and the heat snatch away27 snow,
So for the wicked,28 Sheol snatches them away.29
The mother who suckled (such a one) shall forget him,
His eminence30 shall no longer be remembered.
So wickedness is broken like a stick!
He mates with a barren woman who has no child,
And with a widow and it does not benet him.
But God shall grip the mighty in his strength,
He shall rise up and (the wicked) may not rely on his security.31
(God) shall put him down at on his face, and he will be spread-eagled,
Yea, the eyes of Yahweh32 are upon his ways.33
His exaltation34 is for a little while and it is gone;
Yea, he droops35 like dog-tooth,36 shrivelling up,
Cut down37 like the top ears of corn.
And if it is not so who will give me the lie,
And reduce my statement to nothing?38
The Book of Job
317

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
1
Reading the plur. yeyw with Qere.

Inserting rm or rem with LXX metri causa.
Reading wer with LXX for MT wayyir. See Commentary ad loc.
The verse is probably a secondary expansion of or variant on v. 3.
Reading l, the participle of an /w verb for the preposition al in MT. See
Commentary ad loc.
Reading h or after LXX, V and S for MT hn.
Reading ke illm for MT beoolm (conjecture).
Reading bel leem for MT l leem. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading belayl for MT bell, taking nal w as a dittograph of following y in the
script at the stage of the Qumran MSS.
Reading armm for MT rm, as suggested by the number of the verb.
Reading rm for MT rm. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading binerm for MT bn rm. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading m for mr.
Reading mm for MT mem.
Reading yima for MT yam.
Reading teillm after S for MT tilh, the pronominal sufx having been lost
through similarity to the following hmmh.
Reading l for MT r, as indicated by the pronominal sufxes in the sequel.
Reading l r for MT ler. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yehall gann for MT yeh eann. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading ym meittm kullm for MT ymm ittem-lm. See Commentary ad
loc.
Reading yadw after MT wel-ye r in parallelism with kullmo (all of
them), restored in v. 16b. yadw has been displaced in MT to v. 17a, where it is
superuous to the metre.
Reading yakkr for MT yakkr, the nal w being omitted by haplography after r in
the square script.
Reading qall al-pnm (conjecture) for MT qal-h al-pen. See Commentary ad
loc.
Reading miyym for MT mayim. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading mermm for MT kermm, with corruption of m to k in the Heb. script and
transposing v. 18b and c. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading elq for MT elqm in agreement with the context.
Regarding MT mayim as displaced from v. 19b after corruption. See following
Textual Note.
Reading mmym corrupted to MT mayim and displaced before ele in v. 19a.
Reading am for MT (pausal).
Reading rmh for MT rimmh.
Reading beayyyw for MT beayyn. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading n yhwh for MT nh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading deryw for MT darehem, with V.
Reading rm for MT rmm.
Reading wehumma for MT wehumme.
Reading kl after 11QtargJob for MT kakkl.
Reading yimmal for MT yimml.
Reading leayin for MT leal.
318
1. The versions give no clear idea of the meaning of the text, owing mainly to
their assumption that the verb pan means to hide as in many passages in
the OT, and this has occasioned certain assumptions on their part as to the
state of the Heb. text. But the verb means also to store up or preserve (e.g.
15.20; Hos. 13.12; Ps. 31.20; Prov. 2.7; Song 7.14), and may also have a
homonym cognate with Arab. afana (to set the feet evenly), hence conceivably to x regularly, which the context of the present passage demands
best suiting the object ittm ([set]) times), parallel to his days, sc. of
reckoning; cf. the day of Yahweh in Amos 5.18ff.; Zeph. 1.7ff.; Isa. 2.12ff.;
and particularly Joel 4.1ff. (EVV 3.1ff.), where that day is parallel to that
time () in the present passage and is associated with judgment.
2. is an orthographic variant of the more regular s (to be removed).
The metre demands one more beat, hence rm or rem should be added
after LXX. Perhaps rm was omitted by error owing to its resemblance to
wer (and its shepherd, for MT wayyir) in v. 2b. The shepherd was taken
with the sheep, so that he could not be a witness to the crime. Thus to the crime
of theft the malefactor adds that of kidnapping, which is a capital offence in
the Israelite apodeictic codes (Exod. 20.15; 21.16ff.; Deut. 5.9; 24.7). Alternatively the meaning may be that wicked creditors are not merely content with
foreclosing a mortgage on the ock but they take also a mortgage on the
shepherds person and foreclose it remorselessly, distraining him as a slave.
See further on v. 9.
3. The taking of the ass or the ox of the poor in pledge deprived them of the
necessary means of livelihood, like the distraining of millstones which was
forbidden in Deut. 24.6, One must not take the nether or upper millstone in
pledge (yabl), for (he who does so) takes a mans life in pledge. The offence
was the more heinous since the victim was a widow, who was a special charge
upon the charity of the community in Israel as in Ugarit; cf. Deut. 24.17-22,
where it is forbidden to take a widows cloak in pledge (Deut. 24.17).
9. This verse, with specic reference to inhumane treatment of orphans, presumably the children of widows, belongs here (so Dhorme), rather than in the
list of deprivations between vv. 8 and 10 in MT, where it has been taken as a
marginal gloss on vv. 2-3 (so Siegfried, Budde, Duhm, Hlscher, Stevenson,
Fohrer). G.B. Gray admits the possibility that, if not a gloss, it belongs after
vv. 2-3. In any case it seems best taken as a gloss, or variant on v. 3. gzal
means to plunder or snatch forcibly. The latter is the sense here; cf. 20.19;
Gen. 31.31; Judg. 21.23; 2 Sam. 23.21. MT d, where the sense of the context
indicates breast, is attested in Isa. 60.16, 66. Elsewhere in the OT the word
means plunder, and has been suspected as a scribal error for
1
The Book of Job
319
(breast), but the recurrence of in Isaiah indicates that, as Fohrer suggests,

it may be a byform of the more regular noun. For MT al-n yabl (they
take pledges to the disadvantage of the poor) which is tautological and
colourful in the context, Klostermann proposed l for MT al (the suckling),
the participle of l, cognate with Arab. la, yal (to suckle). The context
indicates the taking of children for the debt of parents; cf. Exod. 21.7; 2 Kgs
4.1; Neh. 5.5; Isa. 50.1; and, in Mesopotamia, the Code of Hammurabi 117.
4. dere usually means way in Classical Heb., which in this context has no
particular point. Here and in other contexts which imply ordered government
of humans or God the noun is cognate with Arab. daraku(n) (administration),
a usage well attested in the the Ras Shamra texts (e.g. Gordon UT Krt, 41f.),
where drk(t) is parallel to mlk (kingship). Thus in Amos 2.7 weere anwm
ya may be read middere anwm ya (and divert the poor from the
administration).
5. h or should be read for MT hn, an Aram. particle meaning as. In v.
5b the metre demands another beat. Besides, MT beoolm (var. keoolm, cf.
S, T and V leoolm), meaning on their business does not suit the gure of
wild asses in v. 5a. Hence we propose that this is the corruption of an original
text be or ke illm (at dusk, lit. in proportion to shadows), assuming
corruption of to in the square script. iar denotes anxious search as in
7.21. arh is probably an adverbial accusative, common in Arabic, meaning
in the evening, rather than ere with h locale, meaning until evening as
suggested by Dahood (UHP, p. 16). In view of nightly depredation by wild
asses on border lands, the former meaning is to be preferred. Weiser, Fohrer,
Gordis and Pope take the word as indicating the desert, where like wild asses
the destitute seek food. But the following verse referring to nightly pilfering of
cornelds and vineyards supports our interpretation. The familiar meaning of
erep in Classical Heb. is prey, but it also means food in general (e.g. Ps.
111.5, ere nan lryw; Mal. 3.10; and possibly Prov. 31.15). Here we
propose that the word is taken in the Aramaic sense of era, used of a creditor
snatching his debts, hence our translation what they may snatch. Oppression
and destitution breed theft.
In MT l leem lannerm Wright read l (so Budde, Beer, Duhm,
Dhorme, Stevenson; Guillaume proposed l (to see) if there be food,
while Hlscher read lalleem (for the food; so too Fohrer). Perhaps we
may rather read bel leem (since there is no food).
6. MT bell (his mixed fodder) might possibly be read bel l (which does
not belong to him), or better, bel lm (which does not belong to them),
with the omission of m before w in the Old Heb. script, after LXX, S, V and T,
the plur. being demanded by the verb yiqr. One Heb. MS reads belayelh
(by night) and is evidently supported by before daylight (so LXX). In view
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of our interpretation of v. 5 this is feasible (so Merx, Bickell, Beer, Budde,

Duhm, Oort, G.B. Gray, Dhorme, Peake, Hlscher, Fohrer). According to the
former reading the reference would be to the poor who are hired or forced to
do work in the elds of others, and would agree with vv. 10bff.; according to
the latter it would agree with v. 5 according to the interpretation we have
adopted, stealing at night by the destitute. In v. 6b it is proposed to emend
r to r (so Budde, Beer, Duhm, Oort, Peake, G.B. Gray, Fohrer, op.cit.,
p. 369, though translating Frevler in p. 367), but without the support of the
versions. r may well stand, denoting the prosperous wicked, as often in the
Psalms. lqa at rst sight suggests leqe and malq, respectively the late
aftergrowth and rains at the end of winter, which coincide with the rst
mowings of spring pasture. Here the verb may be the Heb. cognate of Arab.
laqaa (to gather up hurriedly, as thieves in a vineyard).
8. zerem (rainstorm) and maseh (shelter) are found together as here in Isa.
25.4, where God is a shelter from the storm. ra is found in the OT only in
Job, in 8.16 of a fresh, sappy plant; cf. Arab. radu(n) (fresh, as distinct from
clotted dates). Here it means wet, as the cognate in Ass., Aram. and Syr.
10. Though naked (MT rm, which in any case should be plur. in agreement with the verb) would agree with without clothing in v. 10a, we prefer to
regard it as a corruption of rm (shepherding). Since vv. 10f. refers to men
harvesting, though themselves hungry, pressing olive-oil, though themselves
blistered (see below), and treading out grapes, though themselves thirsty, it is
natural to nd reference to shepherds of the wool-bearing ocks, themselves
without clothing.
11. yahr, they press out olive-oil (yihr), a denominative verb, has suggested that r or rm, which may be a dual, refers to rows of olive
trees (so Dahood 1962: 68, between the rows they pass the noonday,
ohorayim), or possibly, as Hlscher suggested, the dry stone terrace-walls of
the hillsides, where olive-trees are grown (so also Mowinckel). Larchers
translation in JB, they have no stones for pressing oil, evidently envisages the
reading ben rayim and assumes that the noun means an olive-press of
two stones like two courses of masonry, the usual meaning of the noun. In
agreement with the rest of vv. 10f., where the particular privation of the
destitute is mentioned with relation to their particular labour, we suggest that
the text behind MT bn rm contains a reference to a particular hardship of
those who press out the olive-oil which the produce for which they labour was
meant to relieve. Hence we propose that MT is a corruption of binerm (lit.
with their abrasions), taking ner as cognate with Arab. naara (to rub
off) the V form meaning to break out, suppurate; cf. Syr. near, to suppurate. In this case the noun would refer to blisters and suppuration from open
sores of those who manipulated the heavy stone olive-press.
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12. MT mr mem is suspect, having no parallel. This, however, is partially

restored if we emend to mam (by reason of their bondage, as Fohrer,
Lvque after Steuernagel). Closer to MT, and completely restoring the parallelism, is the emendation m mm (yinq) (the bowels of dying men
[groan]). naq is known in the OT only here and in Ezek. 30.24 and in the
noun form in Exod. 2.24; 6.5; Judg. 2.18. The groaning of the bowels of dying
men is no more strange than the life-breath of the injured crying out. Isaiah
63.15 refers to trouble of the bowels, which does not exclude sound. S
supports the reading mm, the desired parallel to allm. The enormity of
such oppression is appreciated in view of the law in the Book of the Covenant
which awards compensation even to injured slaves (Exod. 21.26f.). The
sudden tricolon after the predominant bicola throws the emphasis on to the
third and nal statement, which alleges the indifference of God. MT ym
tilh (considers it a moral obtuseness; cf. 1.22) if not impossible, is at least
suspect, and two Heb. MSS read teillh (prayer), which was also read by S.
This would indicate the reading yima (hears) for MT ym (so Graetz,
Budde, Ehrlich, Ball, Dhorme, Hlscher), though ym, with l understood,
meaning pays heed to, is possible (so Mowinckel, Fohrer, Pope, and
evidently NEB).
13. Dhorme suggested that this verse, introduced by the pronoun hmmh, is
displaced from after v. 16, with which indeed the general sense would agree.
Hlscher regards the verse as in position. He notes that vv. 14-18 was lacking
in the original LXX, and argues that after the addition of vv. 14-18 the original
v. 13 was adapted by the substitution of r (light) for an original l (God)
and then introduced by hmmh, which referred to nocturnal miscreants
mentioned in vv. 14-18. In support of this view it must be admitted that MT
mre (those who rebel against) more naturally indicates a personal object
than the impersonal r, and that l is the more natural antecedent of the
pronominal sufx in deryw (his ways) and neyw (his paths). be in
bemre is probably beth essentiae, signifying in the category of, being
analogous to bi introducing the predicate in a nominal sentence in Arab.
14. For MT lr, which is contradicted by the main point of this passage, l
r (while it is not yet light) has been read generally since it was suggested
by Wright. Hlscher suggested bel r with the same meaning. The verb
ra, used in the commandment in the Decalogue (Exod. 20.13; Deut. 5.17),
though used for unpremeditated manslaughter in the case of an accident (Deut.
4.42; 19.3, 4, 6), usually denotes premeditated killing, whether murder or in
discharge of blood-revenge (Num. 35.27, 30). qal (to kill) is certainly an
indication of Late Hebrew, probably under Aram. inuence. The only instances
in the OT are here and 13.15 as well as Ps. 139.19 and in the verbal noun qeel
in Obad. 9. Verse 14c, on the thief, goes naturally with vv. 15c and 16a, which
refers to burglary, and has been displaced in MT.
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15. n is the adulterer, the participle of na, being used in the Piel in the
seventh commandment (Exod. 20.14; Deut. 5.18). nee is the twilight (cf.
7.4ff.). The adulterer in Ben Sira 23.25f. remarks the darkness is about me.
The twilight is also noted in Prov. 7.9 as the time when the prostitute spies out
her clients. ser has the connotation of Arab. atara (to veil).
16. The verb for house-breaking, ar, lit. to dig, recalls matere in the
Book of the Covenant (Exod. 22.1 [EVV 2]) and Gk. toichruchos (lit. one
who digs through a wall), a relatively simple operation in mud-brick building
or even stone building without mortar. In MT ymm ittem-lm (lit. by day
they seal up for themselves) the transitive verb lacks an object. Dhorme reads
the sing. with S and takes the clause as a relative clause without the relative
particle and with houses as antecedent ([houses] which he has sealed during
the day), that is, on which he has set an identication mark. According to the
arrangement of the text which we adopt v. 16b is parallel to v. 16c (they are
all strangers to the light); so we read ym meittm kullm (day is a terror to
all of them) after Stevenson. The couplet v. 16bc categorized the nocturnal
miscreants introduced as those who rebel against God in v. 13a. In v. 16c, for
the sake of metre, yaa (all together) should be transposed from v. 17a to
before l ye, thus giving a parallel to kullm (all of them) in v. 16b.
The transposition also relieves the overloaded v. 17a.
17. l mwe (the shadow of death) should probably be read for MT
almwe in v. 17a, and alm (darkness) for MT almwe in v. 17b. baleht
occurring in 18.11, 14; 27.30; 30.15, meaning terrors, means rather calamity or destruction in Isa. 17.14 (sing.) and Ps. 73.19; Ezek. 26.21; 27.36;
28.19. Here the plur. means destructive works. LXX tarachos (confusion)
suggests the reading behl.
18. Dhorme retains MT qal-h al-pen-maym (he is a light thing on the
surface of the water); so also Pope, who regards it as displaced from the end
of ch. 27, which he assigns to Zophar. Certainly it connects obviously with
nothing in the strophe vv. 19-24. Budde and Beer emend, reading qal h alpen mym (he is accursed in the sight of Heaven), which has the merit of
agreeing with v. 18b. But since v. 18c refers to the wicked avoiding the
exposed ground to evade detection, Larchers rendering in JB, Headlong he
ees from the daylight, evidently reading qal-h al-pnyw miyym has
much to recommend it, and we adopt it with the modication of the reading
qall (so Fohrer) and pnyw for MT pen proposed by Larcher. The avoidance
of the heights by the miscreant to escape detection reects the highways of
ancient Palestine which often kept to the height of a ridge, which was dry in
all weathers and, once the ridge was attained, more level. Movement along
wadis under the general surface of the land is also a well-known stratagem of
raiding and smuggling parties in the desert. We propose to see a word-play
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323
between qall (ee hastily) in v. 18a and tequllal (will be accursed). On

this reading and interpretation we would see v. 18acb as the conclusion of vv.
13ff. See further, Textual Notes.
19. mm may be omitted from v. 19a metri causa. It has probably been transposed from v. 19b, where it has suffered corruption from an original mmym
(miscreants); cf. Syr. mmy). This would certainly be an Aramaism in Job,
not occurring elsewhere in the OT. mm is used in the OT to denote blemish,
physical (Lev. 21.17ff.; Song 4.7 etc.) and moral (Job 11.15; Prov. 9.7). This
indicates the reading am (snatches them) for MT (pausal) in v.
19b, mmym being used proleptically. The verb is a gnomic perfect.
20. The abrupt change to the sing., if the passage is a unity, may be explained
through the mention of the sing. reem (womb). Alternatively the sing.
pronominal sufx may refer to the indenite subject one. For MT reem
meq, Beer (followed by Duhm, Hlscher, Mowinckel and Fohrer) read
re meqm (the public place of his town), and Dhorme read reem peq
(the womb that formed him); cf. Akk. patqu (to form). But MT may be
retained, meq meaning which gave him suck; cf. Syr. meaq. An apparent
difculty is the use of reem (lit. womb), when breast might rather be
expected. By synecdoche, however, the noun may mean young woman or
potential mother; cf. Judg. 5.30 and the Moabite Stone. In the context
rimmh is likely to be a corruption of rmh (his eminence; so Michaelis,
Bickell, Budde, Beer, Duhm, Peake, Kissane) rather than emh (his name;
so G.B. Gray, Dhorme, Mowinckel, Fohrer).
21. The transitive usage of rh (to keep company with) may be attested in
Prov. 29.3, rh zn, cited by Tur-Sinai, though here the word may be a
noun rather than the participle. Verse 21b refers to the convention of levirate
marriage with the childless widow of a deceased brother. In this case the
property of the dead man is secured not for the husband and his family, but for
the offspring of the widow. The embarrassment of this situation is indicated in
the reluctance of Naomis kinsman to marry Ruth, lest he impair his own
property in redeeming his kinsmens property with his own capital when it
would not be an asset to himself or his own family but to Ruth and her
children (Ruth 4.6).
22. As noticed by Dhorme, MT ma is cognate with Arab. maaka (to
grasp), as in Pss. 10.9; 28.3. Dhorme further reads the participle m, the
subject being God. yqm would then have the pregnant sense of rising in
hostility, as in Exod. 15.7; Deut. 22.26; Amos 7.9; etc.; cf. Arab. qawmu(n)
(enemies). For MT beayyn read beayyyw with LXX, Sym., V and three
Heb. MSS. The word may be taken as in Prov. 27.27; cf. miyeh (Judg. 6.4;
17.10) as signifying his means. Or there may be the nuance of the verbal
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noun in the IInd Form of the Arab. verb taiyatu(n) (security), being a wordplay with ayyyw in this sense, which is usually expressed in Heb. by ba,
and continuing with lea in v. 23a, but with the Arab. sense of at on his
face, from Arab. baaa, to spread out, atten (so Guillaume).
23. l seems a clear case of Aram. le as nota accusativa with the pronominal
sufx. In the context in MT yin is feasibly taken by Guillaume as cognate
with Arab. aana (to be dishevelled), hence our rendering he will be
spread-eagled. On this interpretation v. 23b would refer to the eyes of God
upon the wicked with hostile intent. Taking ayyyw lea and yin in
their usual Heb. sense, Fohrer sees a reference to Gods support of the wicked
oppressors even when their own condence fails (v. 22b) and to his looking
protectively on them (v. 23b); accordingly he regards vv. 22-23 as displaced
from after v. 12. The objection to the otherwise feasible reading n yhwh for
MT nh is that the divine name Yahweh is practically never used in the
poetic dialogue in Job except in citation of a well-known phrase. If the
emendation is accepted it may support the view that 24.19-25 is such a citation
and is secondary.
For MT darehem V reads deryw, which agrees with the sing. subjects
in vv. 22b and 23a.
24. Suddenly in MT, as often in this passage, the number changes to the plur.
In this particular verse, the number changes in a single colon (v. 24a). Preference for the sing. nenn involves less disturbance to MT, where MT rmm
(they have been exalted) may be the corruption of rm (his exaltation;
so, after LXX, Bickell, Duhm, Beer, G.B. Gray, Dhorme, Hlscher, and
Mowinckel, who renders his arrogance). This would involve the reading
wehumma after LXX, involving dittography in MT of w between nal k of
wehumma and initial k in kakkl in the Old Heb. script. ma is a rare verb
in the OT, being attested in Eccl. 10.18 of a roof-tree subsiding and in Ps.
106.43 of the wicked drooping. The verb is used in the Baal myth in the Ras
Shamra texts of Sea subsiding in his conict with Baal (Gordon UT 68.17).
For MT kakkl 11QtargJob reads kybl, which van der Ploeg and van der Woude
(1971: 28) render as dog-tooth after I. Lw (1881: 183). MT yiqqen (lit.
they are drawn together, sc. shrivelled up), is conrmed by 11QtargJob.
For MT yimml the sing. may be read, the nal w being a dittograph before
initial w of the following word. The verbal mlal is found in a similar gure in
14.2; 18.16; Pss. 37.2; 90.6. Cut down like the top ears of corn refers to the
corn cut not by scythe near the ground, but nearer the top of the stalk with the
sickle. The tricolon marks the end of the citation, and v. 25 marks the authors
personal assertion.
25. Here, as in 19.6, 23, is simply an enclitic, like Arab. fa. Parallelism
demands the reading in v. 25b weym leayin mill (and reduce my
statement to nothing).
1
Job 25 and 26
THE INTRODUCTION OF BILDADS THIRD ADDRESS:
INTRODUCED BY 26.2-4, CONTINUED BY 25.2-6
AND CONCLUDED BY 26.5-15*
The ascription of the short ch. 25 to Bildad and the lack of the usual dialectic
introduction suggests that 26.2-4, ascribed to Job in MT, is really the introduction to Bildads third address in the same tone as Eliphazs opening address
(4.3ff.), which may indicate a secondary attempt to construct a third round of
debate. A secondary hand is indicated by the introduction of a Hymn of Praise
in 25.2-6, completed, probably secondarily, by another hand responsible for
26.5-14. The dread of the imperial power of God by the powers in the
heights (25.2) is balanced by the dread of the shades beneath of the majesty
of the Creator. But the rst part of the hymn from 25.3 is interpreted by the
sapiential argument a majore ad minus to assert the futility of the claim of a
mere human being to state the justice of his case to God.
The passage so arranged (26.2-4; 25.2-6; 26.5-14) falls into three parts: the
introduction in the style of sapiential dialectic (26.2-4); a hymn of praise to
divine power and righteousness (25.2-6), which by its adaptation to the
sapiential statement of the signicance of man recalls the sapiential adaptation
of the Hymn of Praise in Psalm 8; and nally the continuation of the hymn of
praise to the power and providence of God (26.5-14), without sapiential
adaptation. 25.2-6 is a single strophe; 26.5-14 falls into two strophes, each
consisting, like 25.2-6, of ve couplets (26.5-9, 10-14), supporting the view
that structurally as well as thematically 25.2-6 and 26.5-14 comprise a unity.
The ascription of 26.2-4 to Bildad rather than, as in MT, to Job is signicantly supported by 11QtargJob.
Chapters 25 and 26 (25.1; 26.2-4; 25.2-6; 26.5-14)
25.1.
26.2.
3.
*
1
Then answered Bildad the Shuhite and said:

(
)1
How you have supported the weak!
How you have saved the arm of the powerless!
How you have counselled the disingenuous,
And shown sound wisdom to the simple!2
See General Introduction, p. 57.
326
Job 25 and 26. The Introduction of Bildads Third Address
4.
From whom3 do you declare such words?

Whose spirit is it that has come forth from you?
25.2.
Dominion and awe rest with Him;

He maintains peace in His heights.
Is there any counting of His troops?
Whom does his ambush4 not surprise?
How can a man be innocent before God?
And how can one born of women be guiltless?
If even5 the moon does not continue to shine,6
And the stars are not pure in His sight,
How much less a humana maggot?
And a son of a humana worm?
3.
4.
5.
6.
26.5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.

The shades writhe beneath,

The waters and their inhabitants.
Sheol is naked before Him;
Uncovered is Perdition.
He it is that stretches out a rmament over the void,
That suspends the earth over nothing,
That binds up the water in His clouds,
Yet the clouds are not burst under their weight.
He covers the face of the full moon,7
Spreading his cloud over it.
He traces a circle8 on the face of the waters
At the very limit of light and darkness.
The pillars of the sky rock,
Astounded at His rebuke.
By His power he stilled the sea,
And by His wisdom9 he struck down Rahab.
By the winds of heaven10 He broke him in pieces;11
His was the hand that pierced the primeval serpent.
These indeed are but the outskirts of His government.12
And what but a whisper of His purpose do we hear therein?
And His powerful thunder13 who can understand?
Textual Notes to Chapters 2526

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
1
Omitting 26.1 after the rearrangement of the text as Bildads speech.

Reading labbr for MT lr. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading me-m for MT e-m.
Reading re with LXX for MT rh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading for MT a.
Understanding yhl with LXX, Aq., T, V and one Heb. MS.
Reading kese for MT kissh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading qq- with S and T for MT q-. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading ien (Qere) for MT ien.
Reading ber mayim for MT ber mayim. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading ibbr for MT ierh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading der or dark for MT deryw. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading raam ger (Qere).
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327
Commentary on Chapters 2526

2. lel-a is another instance of the Aram. nota accusativa le.
3. For MT weiyyh lr ht (and you have given abundant evidence
of sound wisdom) a reading is demanded which observes the parallelism with
How you have counseled the disingenuous?. Here one Heb. MS reads lbr for
MT lr, which suggests either labbr (the brutish, so Graetz) or labbr
(the simple); cf. Syr. berr and late Heb. br (simple, rude). On the meaning of tiyyh as plan, which includes both counsel and successful effect of
counsel, see above on 5.12. The parallelism // tiyyh occurs again in
Isa. 28.29 and Prov. 8.14; cf. tiyyh as parallel to mezimmh in Prov. 3.21.
4. MT e-m is taken by Hlscher as by whose help (lit. with whom?).
Alternatively me-m (from whom?, i.e. By whose authority?) may be
read. In v. 4b Whose breath comes forth from you? animadverts on Job as a
mouthpiece. The sense is Who inspired you? where ra might be expected;
but Bildad may prefer a more derogatory term nemh (breath), though the
word is found in parallelism with ra and qualied by of the Almighty in
32.8, so that we may translate spirit.
25.2. The association of haml with paa (fear in the sense of inspiring
awe) indicates that the verb is innitive absolute of mal (to rule) used as a
verbal noun. It emphasizes the theme of divine government or Kingship. The
Hiphil may imply Gods imposition of his rule, and in consequence his
peace, like that of an imperial sovereign over powers that would contest it,
for example, ym and tannn, which God holds in check (7.12) and the champions of Rahab (9.13), a theme developed in postexilic eschatology, Gods
nal punishment of the host of heaven, in heaven (Isa. 24.21) and rebellious
angels in Dan. 10.13.
3. re (his ambush) sustains the military gure in v. 3a. The verb qm for
rising from an ambush (maar) is used in Josh. 8.19. The sing. participle is
collective, denoting the actual party in ambush.
4. The language is forensic. zh means to be clean, i.e., innocent, in
parallelism with aq, as in Ps. 51.6 (cf. Mic. 6.11). There is a word-play
between zh in this sense in v. 4 and as meaning pure or bright in v. 5.
5. In MT a-yra wel yhl the ancient versions indicate that in yahl is
a mater lectionis, the verb being yhl from hlal as in 31.26. This suggests
the reading yra l yhl (even the moon does not continue to shine).
The w is omitted before l in certain Heb. MSS and S and T.
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328
6. tlh (worm), parallel to rimmh (worm) as in Isa. 14.11, means

literally gnawer.
26.5-11. This passage is omitted in the original version of the LXX. It is
included in its present position in Theod., but that does not exclude the possibility that it is part of Bildads speech. It may have been included in Bildads
speech in MT as part of the orthodox adjustment which the text apparently
suffered in chs. 2427 to soften the arguments of Job against the divine
economy.
5. In view of the well-known motif of the conict of God and the powers of
Chaos, typied as in the Babylonian New Year liturgy and its Canaanite
counterpart by the unruly waters and monsters of the deep, we take mayim
with enhem as the subject of yelel (pausal form yell) which
involves the reading of the colon:
hrem yelel mittaa
mayim weenhem
rem are primarily the shades in the underworld known to be consigned to

the underworld with the various enemies of Cosmos including the Manyheaded One, that is, ltn, or Leviathan (cf. 26.13) in a hymn to the sun included
in the Baal myth of Ras Shamra (Gordon UT 62 rev., 38-52). Among these
enemies of Baal who also menace his kingship and are put in subjection are
tnn and ltn, tannin and Leviathan, who menace the kingship of Yahweh and
are overthrown in the OT (e.g. Isa. 27.1; 51.9; Ps. 74.13-14). In his argument
for the theodicy, Bildad is citing a Hymn of Praise from the liturgy of the New
Year festival, the major theme of which was familiar in Israel.
From meaning the shades of the departed rem came to mean the
vanished races who to the Israelites were invested with gigantic proportions,
hence the rendering giants in Theod., Jerome (commentary and Vulgate), S
and T. Symmachuss rendering theomachoi obviously has in mind the Titanmyth, while Aq. merely transliterates.
6. The parallelism naked (rm) // without covering (n kes) is found
again in 24.7, where the words are used literally. The omniscience of God
penetrates even to Sheol, where Job had wished for refuge and oblivion
(14.13). The parallelism Sheol // Abaddon (Perdition) is found again in 28.22
and Prov. 15.11; 27.20. Abaddon is derived from bad (to perish), but there
is no certain derivation of Sheol. It may be a noun derived from h, found
in 30.14 meaning ruin and in Isa. 10.3; 47.11; Zeph. 1.15 meaning ruin, or
destruction and compounded with l in the elative sense, meaning vast, or
prodigious ruin; cf. harer l, Pss. 36.7; 50.10; arez l, Ps. 80.11.
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329
7. n in the OT designates generally the North, but this is a secondary

meaning, derived from Mt Saphon, jebel al-aqr on the northern horizon of
Ras Shamra, and the seat of Baal as King in the Ras Shamra texts after his
victory over the forces of Chaos. n in such a context symbolized the
divine rule and order, like the mountain of the Lords house at Jerusalem
(Isa. 2.2). It is doubtful if this is the sigicance of the word in the present
passage. It derives rather from h (to spread out); cf. pp (carpet).
The Piel of the verb is used of overlaying with sheet or molten metal (1 Kgs
6.20, 32, 35) or laying a oor (1 Kgs 6.15); cf. rqa, with the same semantic
range and the signicance of rmament or ceiling (rqa) in Gen. 1.6ff.; cf.
NEB spread the canopy of the sky over Chaos. The establishment of the
rmament over the void (th) and the earth over nothing (bel-mh) reects
the initial stage of creation from th wh in Gen. 1.2 (P). In vv. 7ff. note
the introduction of the various exploits of God by participles, a regular feature
of the Hymn of Praise in Israel and in Mesopotamia.
8. The conception of God who binds up the waters in his clouds recalls Prov.
30.4, again in a rhetorical question, m rar-maym baimlh. The gure in
Job may envisage the water-sellers skin, which conserves the shape of the
animal, with the apertures for the legs tied up. The conception of the clouds
as celestial water-skins (niel mayim) is found again at 38.37. The verb
bqa describes the colossal cloudburst in the Flood (Gen. 7.11) and the
bursting of wineskins in 32.19.
9. Several Heb. MSS, Theod., S and V read kiss (throne), seeing a reference to the veiling of the throne (cf. Isa. 66.1, the sky is my throne). Duhm
proposed to emend MT pen to pinn, reading meaz kisse (establishing
rmly the pillars of his throne). Besides the fact that pinnh is found in the
masc. only once in a doubtful passage (Zech. 4.10), and means not pillar but
corner or corner-stone, this would be the only instance of the Piel of az,
which has this meaning in the Qal. In this case meaz, attested in the sense
to close up at Neh. 7.3, might be taken as cognate with Aram. and Syr. aa
(to close up); cf. Akk. uuzzu (to overlay with gold or silver; so Dhorme,
Hlscher and G.R. Driver), a meaning which the verb has in the Hophal in 2
Chron. 9.18.
parz is a peculiar form, apparently a mixed form of pra, or rather pra
(to spread out) and praz (to separate). The form may have arisen from a
scribal note of a variant reading, of the original pra being corrupted to
for the sake of pronunciation before nal z in MT. At any rate, the verb is
treated as pra (to spread out) in Theod., S, T and V. The parallelism with
meaz in the sense overlays supports this and may indicate the participle
pr.
330
10. The conception is that of God tracing a circle on the waters which surround
the earth according to the Mesopotamian conception of the world, East and
West being boundaries of light and dark. We should read the participle qq
in agreement with the style of this Hymn of Praise, but this refers to the
unrepeated act of God in creation, hence the perfect may be read, aq-.
The phrase recurs in the reference to creation in Prov. 8.27, beq
al-pen tehm. We should take qaq here in the sense not of drawing or
engraving, which it often has, but of dening, or prescribing, a boundary, as in
38.10; Jer. 5.22; Prov. 8.29; Ps. 148.6; Mic. 7.11, and in the phrase bel q
(without limit) in Isa. 5.14.
im has here the sense to as regularly in Ugaritic and occasionally in Heb.,
especially in comparison, meaning over against.
11. The pillars of the sky (amm maym) recalls the Mesopotamian
conception of the pillars of heaven (iid am) laid at the horizon, which was
also a Greek conception; cf. Pindar, Pythian Odes I, 39, 20 kin ourania (the
pillar of heaven).
The verb ra, not attested elsewhere in the OT, is taken by Aq. and
Jerome as rock, quake, probably cognate with Arab. raffu (to throb, quake).
ra in Syr. means to be removed.
The verb yimeh is pointed as the imperfect Qal of tmah, well known in
Heb. as to be astounded. This may seem odd of pillars, but no more so than
pillars as the object of Gods rebuke, gaar (his thunder; cf. Pss. 18.6;
104.7; Isa. 50.2); that refers to the convulsions of nature such as the effect of
thunder as the sign of the power of God (so, also of Baal in the Baal myths of
Ras Shamra).
12. The verb rga poses a problem. The parallel ma rha suggests violent
motion, as in Isa. 51.15 and Jer. 31.35, ra hayym wayyeem gallyw. The
verbal correspondence between those two passages indicates an origin in the
liturgy. With the same relevance to Gods control of the sea the verb ar is
used in Ps. 104.7, with which the reading of the verb in the present passage in
S gar would agree. This reading is not proposed by any of the versions in
Isa. 51.15 and Jer. 31.35, so it is likely that the verb means to trouble,
perhaps a metathetic cognate of Arab. raaja with this meaning in the IVth
Form. The association with ym and raha in the present passage recalls the
reference to raha hammeubbt (MT hm e) in Isa. 30.7. For that reason
we nd it likely that ra is a homonym of the verb in Isa. 51.15 and Jer.
31.35, meaning to be at rest; cf. Arab. rajaa (to return, sc. to where one
belongs, sc. to rest) and Jer. 47.6, hr wmm (be at rest and silent), of
a sword returned to its sheath. The parallel with maa suggests that the verb
may be transitive, perhaps Piel, though the Niphal in Jer. 47.14 indicates that
the verb in the Qal has this sense.
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331
ma occurs in the same context of the establishment of Order against the
menace of Chaos in the Baal myth of Ras Shamra; cf. Gordon UT 67 I, 1, 12:
ktm ltn bn br (though thou didst smite Lotan the primeval serpent). On
raha, possibly the agitated one, an appellative of Sea as the adversary of
God in his establishment of Order, see above on 9.13. ka and tenh
(power and wisdom) are the instruments of Gods ordered creation in Jer.
10.12, which like the present passage reects the liturgy of the New Year
festival.
13. It is proposed to read r for MT ber as a fem. sing. subject to the verb
in v. 13a. Dhorme understands MT ierh to refer to the wind dispelling the
clouds, citing the use of the Arab. verb afara with this sense. We prefer the
suggestion of Lyon (1895: 134-35), ber mayim ibbr (he broke him in
pieces with the winds of heaven). Dhorme surprisingly questions how winds
could be said to break the monster in pieces. In fact in the Babylonian creation
myth Marduk rst distended the belly of Tiamat the monster of the Lower
Deep with the storm-wind, which forced her mouth open; through her mouth
he then shot an arrow which pierced her stomach, clave through her bowels,
tore into her womb (Wilson 1858: 10). bra (cf. br the epithet of Lotan,
the serpent in the Ras Shamra texts), does not mean eeing, but belonging
to the past; cf. Arab. baria (to pass from one point to another, e.g. albriu, yesterday)
14. hen is the equivalent of Arab. inn (Verily!).
qe, if associated with Heb. q (end), from qa (to break off), means
not the consummation but the outskirts of Gods works, perhaps even
fragments. In view of the main theme of the passage, the ordered government of God, der (for MT deryw) must surely be taken as government,
as drkt in the Ras Shamra texts in parallelism with mlk (kingship) (Gordon
UT Krt, 42), and daraku(n) in Arab. (so Dahood 1964a: 404).
In mah-me Dhorme takes mah as exclamatory and me (whisper) as
derogatory. See above on 4.12.
In dr in v. 14b the close connections between Gods word or purpose
and the event which he effects is well illustrated. In Heb. dr signies now
the spoken word, and now the matter in purpose or effect, that is to say the
event. Here perhaps the nuance is purpose as in Arab. dabbara, for example
the proverb al-innu yudabbiru wallhu yuqaddiru (Man proposes, God
disposes).
geryw (for MT gerw) is either a plural of excellence or an abstract
plural.
The thunder (raam) is the voice of God which proclaims his power and
heralds the rain, which was anticipated at the New Year festival, where the
theme was Gods triumph over the menace of Chaos and his establishment as
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332
King. In the Baal myth of Ras Shamra, which was related to the same occasion
and celebrating the same theme, Baal, in announcing a new phase of creative
activity, boasts of his new weapon, lightning, the secret of which he declares
(Gordon UT nt III, 17-28):
rgm ltd nm
wltbn hmlt ar
A word which men do not know,

Nor the multitudes of earth understand.
Lvque (1970: I, 306f.) does well to note that apart from in the Book of
Job, raam (thunder) occurs only four times in the OT: in Ps. 77.19 (EVV 18),
where the Great Deliverance at the Reed Sea is a specic instance of the
assertion of Gods order, the theme of the great Autumn Festival, where his
triumph over Chaos was celebrated; in Ps. 81.8 (EVV 7) in connection with the
same theme on the same cultic occasion; in Ps. 104.7, in connection with
Gods triumph over the chaotic waters as a prelude to creation, so feasibly in
the same cultic context; and in Isa. 29.6, with reference to the theophany and
reassertion of the order of God in the political situation.
Job 27
JOBS FINAL RESPONSE TO HIS FRIENDS
Ascribed to Job (v. 1), there is general agreement that 27.2-6 truly expresses
his ardent assertion of his innocence and his determination to maintain his
integrity. But beyond this point the majority of scholars judge the matter of
this chapter quite uncharacteristic of Job. The condemnation of the ungodly
man and his hopeless prospect (vv. 7-10), with the poem on his miserable end
(vv. 13-23), has been assigned to Zophar, whose sentiments it certainly
expresses, despite the fact that there is no customary ascription to him (so
Bickell, Duhm, Peake, Strahan, Stevenson, Ball, G.B. Gray, Hertzberg, Barton,
Lefvre, Tournay, Pope). Dhorme and Hlscher regard vv. 7-12 as Jobs
statement, conning Zophars address to vv. 13-23. According to Dhorme,
Zophars statement begins at v. 13 and continues with 24.18-24; 27.14-23,
which would correspond more closely to the proportions of the various rounds
of debate. Hlscher is also conscious of the deciency of 27.13-23 as a speech
of Zophar, and conjectures the loss of the rst part of his statement. Fohrer
assigns vv. 11-12 to Job as the end of his statement in 26.1-4; 27.2-6, and
regards 27.7-10, 13-23 as a separate poem on the end of the wicked. In view of
Zophars known sentiments on that subject, it may be, if Fohrer is right, that
this was a separate poem intended to be at some stage of the redaction of the
Book Zophars third statement, but never actually assigned to him. On
Fohrers view vv. 11-12,
I will teach you concerning the hand of God,
What is with the Almighty I will not conceal.
You have all seen it for yourselves.
Why then this empty vapouring?
is Jobs statement, though he nds difculty in believing that what Job had to
communicate is anything new. Thus he concludes that vv. 13-23 are no part of
Jobs statement, and conjectures that Jobs communication here promised has
been lost. On our analysis of ch. 27 we would assign the whole to Job.
We would resolve the chapter, Jobs nal reply to his friends, into three
strophes (vv. 2-6, 7-10, 11-23). In vv. 2-6, introduced by an oath, Job protests
his integrity and refuses to accept his friends assumption that his suffering
betokens sin. In vv. 7-10 he invokes the convention of curse in the Plaint of
the Sufferer on those who alienate themselves from him (his enemy or
antagonist) on the assumption that such as sinners are alienated from God. In
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Job 27. Jobs Final Response to his Friends
vv. 8-10 the consequences of the curse are elaborated. Here we would see the
implication that Job expresses his awareness of the consequences if his
assertion of innocence under oath were unfounded. In vv. 11-12, in didactic
style, Job introduces his elaboration of the fate of the wicked in vv. 13-23,
with whom he has associated his antagonists in v. 7, citing their own theme in
their arguments against him, all of which they have seen for themselves,
well-worn dicta assimilated supercially and repeated parrot-fashion, hence
empty vapouring (v. 12). This may well be the citation of a poem from the
Plaint of the Sufferer in its application in the Wisdom tradition.
We suggest that the new element of which Job proposes to convince his
friends (v. 11), who have recurrently but objectively expatiated upon divine
retribution, was his subjective appreciation of the consequences if he were as
guilty as they allege. After Jobs initial oath, therefore, we would assign vv.
13ff. to Job as having the same force as the imprecation in his oath of purgation in ch. 31. This character of Jobs nal statement to his friends, with oath
(vv. 2-6) and imprecation expressed (v. 7) and implied (vv. 8ff.) explains the
heading to the chapter as Jobs ml; cf. Balaams curses and imprecations in
colourful gures (Num. 23.6ff., 18f.; 24.3ff., 15ff., 20, 21f., 23f.)
Chapter 27
1.
And Job added his sworn declaration and said:
2.
As God lives who has put aside my right,

As the Almighty lives who has embittered my life!
As long as all my breath is within me,
And the God-given breath is in my nostrils,
My lips shall speak no falsehood,
Nor my tongue patter deceit!
God forbid that I should admit that you were right!
Till I die I will not give up my integrity.
I hold fast to my innocence and will not let it go;
None of my days is a reproach1 to my heart.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
1
Let my enemy be as the wicked,

My antagonist as the unrighteous!
For what is the hope of the godless2
When he lifts up his soul to God?3
Will God listen to his cry
When distress comes upon him?
Will he have condence in the Almighty?
If he calls to God, will his entreaty be admitted?4
I will teach you concerning the power of God,
The purpose of the Almighty I will not hide.
You have all seen it for yourselves;
Why then this empty vapouring?
This is the portion5 of the wicked from God,
And the lot of the tyrant6 which he will receive from the Almighty.
The Book of Job

14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
335
If his sons grow up it is for the sword,

And his offspring have not enough to eat;
Those of his sons who have survived are gathered up7 by the plague,
And he will have no widows to weep.
Though he heap up silver like dust,
And lay up dress in piles,
He may provide himself, but the just shall wear it,
And the innocent shall divide the silver;
His house which he builds is like a birds nest,
Even like the hut which a crop-watcher makes.
He lies down rich for he has a store;8
He opens his eyes and it is gone.
Terrors overtake him by day,9
In the night he is snatched away by a tempest.
The east wind lifts him up and he is gone,
Yea, it sweeps him from his place;
Men bombard him without mercy,
He strives hard to ee from their power.
Men clap their hands at him,10
And hiss him away from wherever he may be.

Reading yere for MT yeera.
Omitting MT k yi after the corruption of v. 8b. See following note.
Reading yi leelah na after LXX and S for MT yel elah na in agreement with the following verse.
4. Reading yr-l with LXX and S for MT beol-.
5. Omitting the superuous m, metri causa.
6. Reading r for MT rm, omitting nal m as a dittograph before the following
m.
7. Reading yiqqa for MT yiqqar. See Commentary ad loc.
8. Reading wel s for MT wel ys.
9. Reading kayym for mt kammayim. See Commentary ad loc.
10. Reading yipq lyw kappayim with Theod. and V, assuming dittography of m
before w in the Old Heb. script. For MT kappm S and LXXA and L read his hand.
1.
2.
3.
1. In MT ml (lit. likeness), insofar as it applies to Jobs declaration, might
be rendered as reection, denoting the statement of truths corresponding to
experience, like Proverbs (miel elmh) and, like them, couched in gurative language and often simile. But in view of Jobs curse upon his estranged
friends as the wicked, elaborated in graphic detail in vv. 4ff., ml may
have the same signicance as ml introducing Baalams pronouncements in
Num. 23.6ff., 18ff; 24.3ff., 15ff., 20, 21f., 25f. The curse, with consequences
graphically elaborated thus becoming a by-word or admonitory example
(ml), is well exemplied in the Twelve Adjurations and the sequel in Deut.
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336
27.15-26; 28.16ff.; cf. esp. v. 37. This well exemplies Jobs oath (vv. 2-4)
and its amplication (vv. 8, 14-23), with his awareness of the like consequences to himself of guilt and hypocrisy, like his self-imprecation in his great
oath of purgation (ch. 31). This suitably ends his dialogue with his friends.
Though we may understand this specic sense of Jobs ml in ch. 27, we do
not nd it possible to express its full connotation in a single word, certainly not
discourse of EVV, but hope that sworn declaration may convey the sense.
2. The clauses hsr mip and hmar na are relative clauses, the relative
particle being omitted as often in poetry.
3. k is the asseverative particle introducing the vow after the oath. The
apparent tmesis between kol and nim (cf. kol-d na b in 2 Sam. 1.9) is
explained in GKC (128e) as not tmesis at all, but, on the assumption of the
adverbial sense of kol, wholly. According to the punctuation of MT, however,
d is regarded as a noun, which is apparent in the phrases be and m,
kol- meaning thus the whole while (so Dillmann, Budde, Ehrlich, whom
we follow). nemh is here the life-breath, and ra, which may denote inspiration, has here the same signicance, though the physical breath is visible
evidence of the invasive divine inuence (ra); cf. Gen. 2.7.
4. hh means to con over inaudibly or audibly, as for instance the Law (Ps.
1.2). In the present passage, by our translation patter we have tried to convey
the manner of the recital of conventional moral platitudes, which Job spurns.
Specically Job may be disowning acquiescence in his friends indictment and
their exhortation to seek pardon for guilt that he will not admit, the substance
of his declaration in v. 5.
5. llh ll (ad profanum!) is part of the oath formula, indicating that which
was not to be tolerated with relation to God. The acuteness of Jobs dilemma is
underlined in this passage in his oath by the life of God who, he claimed, had
wronged him (v. 2) and by his assertion that to admit the guilt that his friends
allege against his own clear conscience would be sacrilege in the sight of God.
6. The verb ra is attested as transitive in the Qal (e.g. Pss. 69.10; 119.42;
Prov. 27.11), but is generally used transitively in the Piel, which we adopt
here. The objection to MT l- yeera le miyymy is that the verb seems
to want an object. It is proposed to nd that in miyymy, min being taken in
the partitive sense, None of my days is a reproach to my heart, sc. conscience
(so Dillmann and the older commentators), which we adopt. Duhm and
Dhorme emended yeera to yepar (my heart is not ashamed of my days).
7. The colon, assigning Jobs adversaries (his enemy, y, and antagonist,
miqmm), that is, those who, in inferring his guilt from his suffering, alienate
themselves from him, to the category of those who are foredoomed to the
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The Book of Job
337
punishment described in vv. 8-10, 14ff., is to be understood in the formal

category of the curse of the innocent sufferer in the Plaint of the Sufferer, esp.
Pss. 58.7-10 (EVV 6-9); 69.23-29 (EVV 22-28); 139.19-22.
8. According to MT of vv. 8ff., the sense is What hope has a man of a hearing
when he is cut off (yibba being read by Oort) when God withdraws (yel)
his life? But Hlscher feasibly proposes that k yibba is a gloss on yel
elah na after the corruption of an original yia leeloah na (lifts his
soul to God), read by Ball, Dhorme, Tur-Sinai, Hlscher and Peake after S.
For the phrase n nee, meaning to appeal, cf. Deut. 24.15; Pss. 25.1;
86.4; 143.8; Jer. 22.27. This reading and interpretation is supported by the
following verse. This sense of yia na suggested to Mandelkern that MT
k yia should be emended to k yiga (when he entreats, so also Dhorme).
This, however, in our opinion, overloads the colon, though it is admitted by
Mowinckel, Pope and Terrien.
10. On yiann (puts his condence in), see on 22.6. Taking the parallelism
in vv. 9-10 as chiastic, we accept the reading yr-l (will his entreaty be
accepted?) for MT beol- (at all times), which has no parallel in the
context (so Beer, Hlscher, Stevenson after LXX and S). yiqr is a case of the
jussive in the protasis of a conditional sentence without a conditional particle
(GKC, 159b).
11. y (lit. hand), means here power or even management as parallel to
purpose.
aer im-adday (lit. what is with the Almighty) denotes Gods intimate
thought and purpose; cf. imm in parallelism with bileae in 10.13; cf.
9.35; 23.14; 1 Kgs 11.11 and Arab. and ka (lit. with me like this, i.e. it
is my opinion).
12. heel is used here as in 7.16; 9.29; 21.34, and the refrain in Eccl. 1.2; 2.1,
14, 15; 6.4, 12; 7.15; 9.9; etc. to mean vapour or what is insubstantial.
13. As the verse stands in MT it consists of two cola, each of four beats. This is
supported by the ancient versions, but it may well have consisted originally of
two cola, each of three beats. MT may be reduced by the omission of m,
which seems superuous in v. 13a and by yiqq in v. 13b, which seems
pleonastic.
in MT im-l should probably be omitted as a dittograph of in r
notwithstanding im meaning from in Ugaritic, which Dahood considers
(UHP, p. 32; Pope).
In v. 13b the versions attest MT arm, which we suspect after the sing.
r in the parallel colon, and we assume a dittograph of nal m before
miadday.
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338
14. In v. 14a lem-re (pausal), where the archaic form of the preposition
may be noted, is a truncated form of the nominal sentence as the apodosis of a
conditional sentence.
15. MT eryw (Qere) bammwe yiqqr (his survivors shall be buried
by the death) is highly suspect and various conjectures have been made.
Stevensons conjecture eim ym qeryw is not so far from MT as it
seems and, if correct, would imply a man would have no kinsman to bury him,
nor widows to mourn him (v. 15b) in his community since they too would be
captured by raiders. The sword and famine having been listed as taking off a
mans family, it is natural to look for a third cause of death. This Dhorme
found in pestilence, in which sense he took hammwe of MT, where the
denite article excludes death. Dhorme cites this specic meaning of mtu in
the Tell el-Amarna Tablets (Knudtzon 190815: 244, 31f.), and mtnu as the
appellative of the plague in Ass. (so Buttenwieser and Mowinckel). Still, the
statement his survivors will be buried by the plague is strange, and we
propose the emendation yiqq for MT yiqqr ([his survivors] will be
gathered by the plague), which recalls the passage in the Ugaritic Legend of
Krt, 18 mmt yitp rp (at ve years old Reef gathered them to himself);
cf. Arab. qubia (lit. he was gathered, i.e. he died). The implication is that
his wives will also be taken so that he will have no widows to mourn him nor,
if he die childless, will his name and estate be perpetuated by levirate marriage.
In support of this interpretation is the alternative of mwe and ere in Jer.
15.2; 43.11, where also, signicantly, mwe has the denite article.
16. For MT malb (clothing) LXX read gold, which the parallelism would
lead us to expect. But the sequel in v. 17 supports MT. Clothes, implying the
wardrobe of a rich man, with which he is at pains to provide himself (yn)
contrast the meagre shift of the poor. The equation wicked/rich, poor/righteous
(addq) reects the sentiment of the Plaint of the Sufferer in the Psalms, and
the conception of the righteous, falling heir to the possessions of the wicked
recalls Prov. 13.22. hn (lit. cause to be) in the sense of providing beforehand is attested in 1 Chron. 22.8, 14 (materials for the Temple), and in Job
39.41 (food for the ravens).We take mer as a homonym of mer (mud),
attested in the piles (omrm) of dead frogs in the plague in Egypt (Exod.
8.10); cf. the wordplay between the word in this sense and amr (ass) in
Samsons exploit with the jaw-bone of an ass (Judg. 15.10).
18. On v. 18a LXX has a conation of two readings, MT (moth) and
a (spider); cf. 8.14, where the house of the spider is the symbol of
impermanence. The latter reading is supported by S (so Mowinckel, Fohrer,
Terrien). It is suggested on the other hand that MT is cognate with Arab
au(n) (a birds nest; so Schultens, Ehrlich, Dhorme); cf. Akk. asasu,
which gives a better parallel with the hut of the watcher of the crops in v. 18b
(sukkh h nr, cf. Arab. niru[n]).
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The Book of Job
339
19. For MT ys (he will [not] be gathered) LXX and S read ysi (he will
not do so again). Taking the pronominal sufx in nenn to refer to the
mans wealth (RSV) rather than to himself, we would nd an antecedent in
s (store), and for MT wel ys we suggest wel s (he has a
store); cf. Neh. 12.25; 1 Chron. 26.15.
20. The parallel by night in v. 20b indicates ymm (by day) for MT
kammayim (Wright, Budde, Ehrlich, Ball, Dhorme, Hlscher) or kayym.
The feminine singular of the verb with the feminine plur., here ballh (cf.
eal-n behm werekk, 12.7), is the regular agreement in Arab. when the
verb precedes the subject.
gna here has not so much the sense of removing stealthily as summarily,
as in kidnapping in the Book of the Covenant (Exod. 21.16) and Deut. 24.7; cf.
Gen. 40.15 (of Joseph being kidnapped and sent away summarily to Egypt).
The verb has probably the same sense in the Decalogue (Exod. 20.15; Deut.
5.19) (Alt 1953).
21. qm (the East wind) is the sirocco, the blasting hot wind from the
desert, and is so understood by Theod, and V, where it is rendered as the
burning wild; cf. the sudden ruin of Jobs family (1.18).
The Piel of ar is a denominative verb from aar, an orthographic variant
of the more common saar (whirlwind).
The driving forth of the miscreant in vv. 20ff., every mans hand against
him (vv. 22-23), recalls the fate of Cain (Gen. 4.12-15) and of the murderer of
Dnils son in the Ras Shamra text (Gordon UT Aqht 152ff.), on whom Dnil
invokes a curse that he should be
amd gr bt il Ever seeking sanctuary at the shrine of El,
nt br plmh A fugitive now and for ever.
22. hil al (to throw a missile at) without the direct object is found in
Num. 35.20. The pronominal sufx in y refers to the indenite subject of
hilk (one, i.e. persons).
23. The clapping of the hands, perhaps with a glancing blow of palm from
palm, as in the Arab gesture to indicate that an affair is nished, is like
whistling (cf. Lam. 2.15; Jer. 49.17; Zeph. 2.15), a gesture of mockery.
Job 28
AN INDEPENDENT POEM ON THE TRANSCENDENCE
OF WISDOM
This is an independent poem on the transcendence of Wisdom. It is of uncertain authorship, possibly composed by one of the circle of the author. It may
an independent composition by the author of the Book of Job himself, justly
valued by his circle and included in the Book in appreciation of the master. Its
insertion at this point was determined by the fact that the Dialogue with the
friends ends with Jobs declaration in ch. 27 before his direct challenge to God
in his apologia pro vita sua (ch. 29), culminating in his oath of purgation (ch.
31). As anticipating the theme of the Divine Declaration (38.140.14), the
poem was probably not included by the author of the Book. As a sapiential
poem on the transcendence of Wisdom it has a general literary afnity with the
self-laudation of Wisdom in Proverbs 8 or the short hymn on Wisdom and its
benets in Prov. 3.13-18.
The poem is divided into three parts, possibly strophes, by the refrain
Where shall Wisdom be found? (v. 12) and Whence comes Wisdom? (v.
20). The omission of the question from the beginning of the poem indicates
that it is a conclusion to vv. 1-11 and vv. 13-19, but as such it serves also as an
introduction to vv. 13-19 and vv. 21-27 (v. 28 being an appendix), with a
certain analogy to question and answer in the sapiential tradition (e.g. Prov.
23.29ff.; Eccl. 8.1ff.; so Westermann 1977: 104-107). Fohrer after Duhm
divides the poem into four strophes: vv. 1-6, 7-11 + 24, 12-18 (19?), 20-27.
Besides the interrogatory introduction at vv. 12 and 20, he conjectures its
inclusion before vv. 1 and 7 (so also Lefvre). This, however, has no support
either in MT or any of the ancient versions. The subject-matter of vv. 1-11, the
inaccessibility of Wisdom to humans who determinedly penetrate the furthest
regions and move mountains(v. 9) in persistent prospecting for precious
metals and gems, does not readily fall into two strophes. Nor does vv. 12-19,
on the inestimable value of Wisdom, present such a strophe as Fohrer claims,
opening as it does with the same theme as vv. 1-11, while vv. 21-27, where,
after deliberate suspense, the answer is reached, is certainly a denite strophe,
as Fohrer recognizes. On such considerations we propose to treat the poem as
falling into three parts distinguished by the interrogatory refrain in vv. 12 and
20.
1
The Book of Job
341
The subject matter indicates that vv. 7-8 in have been displaced from
between vv. 12 and 13, and v. 28 is probably an editorial gloss (see Commentary ad loc.). In admitting that wisdom is accessible to humans, except by the
fear of God, v. 28 apparently contradicts, or at least modies, the main part of
the poem on the transcendence of Wisdom. Another indication of the editorial
gloss is the divine title anay, which is unique in the Book.
Chapter 28
l.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
9.
10.
11.
12.
7.
8.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
Surely there is a mine for silver,

And a place for gold which humans rene.
Iron is taken from the earth;
And humans make stone to exude1 copper.
Humanity2 has put an end to the darkness,
Searching its furthest bounds
For stones in gloom and darkness.
They have opened shafts3 where no one lives;
Let down4 without foothold,
They have hung far from others; they have swayed to and fro.
The earth from which food should come
Is turned5 underneath6 into something like a re,
A place the stones of which are lapis lazuli
With its specks7 of gold.
(Humanity) has put forth its hand on the inty rock,
And overturned mountains by the roots.
In the rocks they have cut channels,
And their eyes have seen every precious thing.
They have searched8 the sources9 of rivers,
And brought hidden resources10 to light.
But Wisdomwhence comes she?11
And where is the abode of understanding?
The pathway the vulture knows not,
Nor has the eye of the hawk descried it.
Big game has not trodden it,
Nor the lion passed over it.
Humanity does not know the way to it,12
Nor is she found in the land of the living.
The deep says, She is not in me,
And the sea says, She is not with me.
No ne gold may be given for her,
Nor silver weighed out as her price.
Not in gold of Ophir can she be valued,
In precious onyx and lapis lazuli.
Gold and glass are not to be valued with her,
Jewels of ne gold cannot be exchanged for her.
Speak not of coral or crystal;
The possession of Wisdom is above rubies.
342
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
Job 28. An Independent Poem on the Transcendence of Wisdom

The topaz of Cush cannot compare with her,
In pure gold she cannot be valued.
But Wisdomwhence comes she?
And where is the abode of understanding?
She is hidden from the eyes of all living,
She is concealed from the birds of the heavens.
Perdition and Death declare,
With our ears have we heard a rumour of her.
God understands the way to her,
And He knows her abode;
For He looks to the ends of the earth;
He sees all that is under the heavens.13
He who settled14 the force of the wind,
And meted out the waters by measure,
When he made a decree for the rain,
And a course for the rumble of the thunder;
Then did he consider and assess her,
He studied her15 and explored her potentialities.
And he said to humanity, Behold!
The fear of the Lord is Wisdom,
And turning from wrong is understanding.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
Reading yq or yaq for MT yq. See Commentary ad loc.

Inserting m after am as an antecedent to h in v. 3b.
Reading pre for MT pra assuming omission of w by haplography before n of
nelm and assuming haplography of m in MT naal.
Assuming MT hannikm to be a corruption of hannipm (let down). See
Commentary ad loc.
Reading nehpeh in agreement with ere.
Reading tath for MT weath, w being a dittograph of m in preceding word in
the Old Heb. script.
Understanding the plur. as dust particles.
Reading ipp with LXX, Aq., Theod. and V for MT ibb. See Commentary ad
loc.
Reading mibbe for mibbe. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading fem. sing. ending for MT possessive sufx.
Reading t with one Heb. MS, cf. v. 20, for MT timm. Alternatively t
may be read.
Reading darkh with LXX for MT erkh (comparison), which is probably a
secondary variant.
Reading kol-taa-hamayim metri causa with LXX and V for MT taa kolhamayim.
Reading haeh after LXX, A and V, where a perfect or a participle is suggested.
Reading henh for MT henh with ve Heb. MSS.
The Book of Job
343
1. k may be formally a conjunction, in which case it would indicate that the
poem was introduced by the interrogative refrain (so Duhm, Fohrer). But,
rejecting such an assumption, we regard it as the asseverative enclitic, as in
Ugaritic, where it emphasizes the nal verb (e.g. Gordon, UT 51, II, 13f., hlk
bl trt ktn, Atharat indeed eyed the going of Baal), and in Heb. poetry
introducing the nal verb (e.g. Ps. 118.10-12) or a nal statement (e.g. Deut.
32.9). The parallelism with lazzh yzqq (for gold which they rene)
suggested to Dahood (1963c: 52) that m, from y, is cognate with Arab.
waua (to be pure, hence, to rene), or, as he suggested, to smelt. The
parallelism with mqm, however, indicates the meaning source or mine.
The verb zqaq, used of rened metal in 1 Chron. 28.18; 29.4; Ps. 12.7 and
parallel to ihar (to purify) in Mal. 3.3, may be a cognate of Ass. zaqqu (to
blow violently) as in the rening process. The verb describes distillation from
the clouds in 36.27 and puried wine in Isa. 25.6, so that it may be no more
than an incidental homonym of Ass. zaqqu.
2. een, being fem., must be the object of the verb, the subject being indenite
(one makes to exude). The verb may be either the Hiphil of q (cf. 29.6,
r yqmen, the rock used to exudeolive oil), in which case yq or
yaq should be read for MT yaq, with the same meaning. Terrestrial iron as
distinct from meteoric iron came into use in Palestine in the thirteenth century
BCE, having been already worked by the Hittites in Asia Minor in the middle
of the second millennium BCE, when it was still a precious metal in Egypt. In
the rst millennium BCE it was mined in the Ajlun district of Transjordan
(Glueck 194549: 336-50) and worked at Khirbet Deir Alla, possibly Sukkoth,
in the Jordan Valley.
3. tal, as in 26.10, means the limit or outmost boundary. In v. 3c een
el wealm (MT almwe) is taken by Hlscher as a gloss (so Fohrer). We
have taken een as a collective sing., the object of the search, precious stones
and ores which were set in gloom and darkness. Pope and Terrien apparently
take it in opposition to tal as the rock which is searched. The nal colon of
a tricolon is always suspect to Hlscher, but an occasional tricolon was used to
relieve the monotony of the prevailing bicola. If the colon v. 3c is original,
een as the object of qr in v. 3b is suspended until the nal colon, a
literary convention quite common in Heb. and Ugaritic poetry; see, for
example, Gordon UT 127, 54f.:
ybr rn ybn
ybr rn rik
ttrt m bl qdqdk
May Horon break, my son,

May Horon break thy head,
Athterat-name-of-Baal thy skull.
344
A glossator would surely have used a much less poetic gure and form. It may
be noted that v. 3c is omitted in LXX, which also omits vv. 4a, 5-9a, 14-19,
21b-22a, 26b-27a. This, however, indicates compassion in LXX rather than
glosses to the original text, such compassion being a marked literary tendency
in LXX.
4. In view of the 3rd plur. verbs dall and n, we would read MT pra in v.
4c as plur., either in scriptio defectiva or with the omission of nal w by
haplography before the following n in the Old Heb. script. For MT naal the
plur. should possibly be read. The word in Heb. and Arab. normally means
valley or torrent, but in Late Heb. it denotes the shaft or gallery of a mine,
comparable possibly to a narrow valley. In MT hannikm minn-reel
(forgotten from/without foot) is practically unintelligible. We would suggest
that the verb is a scribal corruption of the verb a in the square script. This
verb, meaning to pour, may be understood in the context as paying out a
rope on which workers are let down without a foothold (minn-reel). Heb.
a has an Arab. cognate afaa with the same meaning, and the noun
afau(n) (foot of mountain) may derive from a homonym meaning to
lower, but this we cannot attest. MT dall is assumed to be from dlal, which
has an Arab. cognate, dalla, used in the form tadaldala (to dangle), the
obvious sense of the verb in v. 4c. dlal seems a byform of the more usual
dlh, which has this sense in Prov. 29.7. In v. 4a, reading pra nelm am
gr (pausal gr) for MT pra naal mim-gr, Graetz renders a strange
people has bored galleries (so Giesebrecht, Dhorme, Hlscher, Fohrer), after
V and S. This may be supported by the remoteness of the mining operations
from where the Book of Job was written or to specialized industry of a miners
and smiths caste, such as the Kenites, who might fairly be called am gr as
federates of Israel. Dhorme notes besides that Semitic foreigners were
employed by the Egyptians in the mines of Sinai, as their grafti show. Similarly, condemned Christians were employed by the Romans in the copper
mines of Punon (modern Feinn) and other mines in the escarpment east and
west of the Arabah. gr may have already acquired the connotation of slave,
as apparently in 1 Chron. 22.2 and 2 Chron. 2.16ff., where grm (resident
and protected aliens) were conscripted by Solomon for public works (so
Buttenwieser). men (far from men), however, in v. 4c indicates that MT
mim gr is parallel, and means where no one lives, min in both cases
indicating remoteness or an uninhabited region. The operation, and indeed the
whole verse, is reminiscent of Bedouin ventures in the quest for scroll
fragments in the Dead Sea escarpments and the Wadi Murabbaat.
5. The colon seems to point to the contrast, the natural production of food on
the earths surface in cooperation with nature and the unnatural riing the
bowels of their mother earth which in consequence glows either with the
miners torches or by reason of the breaking of rocks with re, a technique of
mining known in ancient and modern times (so Hlscher after Lhr in 173ff.).
1
The Book of Job
345
6. mqm sappr anh (ignoring the hyphen in MT) and taken in the sense
a place the stones of which are lapis lazuli may be suggested by the familiar
description of the Promised Land in Deut. 8.9, a land of stones of which are
iron. This may have occasioned the use of the fem. pronominal sufx in
anh, which is incongruous with the masc. pronominal sufx in l and
after the antecedent mqm. aer zh (lit. dust-grains of gold) may refer
to the shining specks of iron pyrites in lapis lazuli.
9. The poet selects the hardest stone int (allm), Akk. elmeu, as the
object of human effort, and the largest mass, he has overturned mountains by
the roots.
10. yer with the denite article or dened as yer mirayim (Amos 8.8; cf.
9.5), is an Egyptian loanword, the Nile, and is taken here to denote guratively mine-galleries. We question if the meaning is not rather drainage channels near the source of a river (in the rocks) for diverting the streams in
search for folds in their beds, which seems to agree with a kindred operation in
v. 11, the damming up of rivers to bring hidden treasures to light.
11. mibbe, or better mabbe, nehr may be preserved; cf. mbk nhrm (the
sources of the rivers), the seat of El in the Ras Shamra texts (Gordon UT 49.I,
5; 51, IV, 21; 2 Aqht VI, 47), where the variation nbk also occurs.
For MT ibb (he has bound up) LXX, Aq., Theod. and V render he has
searched, which suggests ipp, but the interchange of b and p might indicate an orthographic variant as frequently in Semitic languages. If ibb is
read meaning binds up, the reference might be to the diversion of a river to
search its bed for alluvial gold by damming up (binding) its source (so
Weiser, Gordis and Fohrer). But the searching of the sources gives a more
natural parallel to the bringing of the secrets to light in v. 11b, and should be
accepted (so Mowinckel, Pope). The sources of rivers may refer to subterranean depths, whence the rivers rose from the lower deep of Semitic
cosmology, but it may also refer to the depth of the sea or ocean currents
(nehrm), specically referring to pearl shing, as in the Persian Gulf. In MT
r we understand the locative sense, the locative ending being omitted in
scriptio defectiva.
7. ayi (pausal yi) is an unspecied bird of prey, such as those Abraham
drove away from his sacrice (Gen. 15.11), probably the vulture, selected
because of its strong ight and far sight, and ready location of prey from an
apparently impossible distance. The word is probably an appellative,
screamer, from a verb known in 1 Sam. 25.14 (of Nabal scolding David),
with Syr. and Arab. cognates.
ayyh may be cognate with Arab. yuyuu(n), a kind of hawk, possibly
another onomatopoeic word screecher.
1
346
The verb za (to look upon) is known only here and at 20.9 and in Song
1.6, eezan haeme (because the sun has looked upon me).
8. This is another pair of relative clauses qualifying n (a path). benaa, a phrase used in the OT only here and in 41.26 possibly, is of uncertain
signicance. In Job 28.8 it is parallel to aal, which is usually taken as a lion
(see on 4.10). We should probably take ben-aa in its general sense great
beasts after the Arab. cognate cited by BDB, aiu(n) (bulky or a man of
great rank), so big game. The usual phonetic correspondence of Heb. to
Arab. or t is here contravened because of the nal .
h (to pass) is known only here in the Qal in the OT. It is very common
in Aram., Syr. and Arab. in the sense of passing on, away.
This passage, describing the remoteness and inaccessibility of the place
where Wisdom is to be found, insofar as it interrupts the account of mining in
vv. 1-6, 9-11, is probably displaced from between vv. 12 and 13, where it
effects a bridge between the passages on the inaccessibility of Wisdom and its
rare value.
13. The verb timm (it is [not] attained), in v. 13b supports the LXX
reading darkh (the way to it) for MT erkh, which is probably a secondary
variant which supplanted darkh after association with vv. 15ff.
14. tehm is the subterranean water, Akk. tiamtu, the primordial power of
Chaos subdued by Marduk; ym again denotes, as well as the sea conned to
its proper place, the primordial power of chaos which menaced the power of
Baal in the Canaanite myth of the New Year festival. In view of this association of the lower deep and the sea with the primordial conict at which
ordered creation emerged, there may be a double reference to Wisdom as
beyond human attainment now and as being with God in the beginning and
above Chaos; cf. Prov. 8.22-31, particularly v. 24, when there were no depths
(tehm) I was brought forth, and v. 29, When he assigned to the sea its
limit (then I was beside him), also John 1.1, In the beginning was the
Word, and the Word was with God
15. The incomparable value of Wisdom beyond that of precious stones, the
theme of vv. 15-19, is the theme also of Prov. 8.10-11, 19.
sr for MT ser, in full zhb sr, found in 1 Kgs 6.20, is taken by
Dhorme as massive gold, citing Ass. hura sagru, and suggesting that the
root of Heb. sr is sar (to close). The term, however, may be connected
with Arab. ajara (to heat in an oven or crucible), so meaning to rene.
tath means lit. in its place, as in the succession of kings in the Books
of Kings.
The Book of Job
347
16. l-tesulleh means literally it will not be balanced, that is, weighed. The
verb is found only here and at v. 19, again in the Pual, and as a variant form in
Lam. 4.2. BDB connects it with sal (a basket, Gen. 40.16, 17, 18; Exod.
29.3, 23, 32; Lev. 8.2, 26, 31; Num. 6.15, 17, 19; Judg. 6.19), in which grain
was probably weighed, hence the meaning to weigh.
keem is understood by all the ancient versions through its association with
Ophir as gold. The word is possibly cognate with Ass. katmu (to cover, or
close up); cf. Arab. katama (to conceal). The term may have arisen through
the careful concealment of gold in store or transit. A more probable explanation is given by Pope on the basis of Egyptian references to nb-n-ktm (gold of
ktm), ktm denoting the deserts of Upper Egypt and the Sudan from which gold
(nb) was drawn, making Egypt the great source, or entrepot, of gold in the
ancient Near East, as is indicated in the Tell el-Amarna tablets. The locality of
Ophir is uncertain. In Gen. 10.29 it is located between Sheba and Havilah, thus
in southern Arabia. The mention of apes and baboons among Solomons
cargoes from Ophir (1 Kgs 9.28f.), however, suggests remoter regions, which
have been sought in Africa and India. Since Solomons trading voyages lasted
three years (1 Kgs 10.22) it has been suggested that Ophir must have been
much further away than southern Arabia or Somaliland (Punt), which is
known from Egyptian inscriptions as a source of gold. In favour of East Africa
is the known Phoenician contact with the region between the Zambesi and the
Limpopo. The Sanskrit word for apes, however, in 1 Kgs 10.22 suggests
contacts with India. In view of the biblical tradition that Ophir was in Arabia,
known to the Phoenicians as auriferous (Ezek. 27.22), Ophir may denote
southern Arabia as an entrepot for merchandise from the farther East and also
from east Africa. LXX renders Ophir with an initial S, which has suggested
Sofala some 200 miles from the famous ruins of Zimbabwe in East Africa, and
Supara on the Malabar coast. This spelling, however, has no basis in MT, and
probably reects the seaborne trade with India in Ptolemaic times, when LXX
was produced. ham, noted with gold as a product of Havilah in Gen. 2.12, is
mentioned as one of the semi-precious stones, usually taken as onyx, in the
high priests pectoral (Exod. 25.7; 28.9; 20).
17. ze is hapax legomenon in the OT, but is better known in Aram. ze
and Arab. zajjatu(n), which had a scarcity value in antiquity. Blown glass
was unknown until Roman times, where already Akka was famous for this
industry by the middle of the rst century CE (Josephus, War 2.10.2). But it
had been made in ancient Egypt since the second millennium BCE of a fusion
of quartz sand containing calcium carbonate with natron or plant ashes and
colouring, material such as manganese, copper, cobalt and iron compounds.
Strips of this were built up round a sandy clay core, or, in the case of beads,
around wire, which was later extracted, and the article was then re-fused and
348
polished (Engelbach 1942: 133f.). Such glass was used largely for inlay, as on
the throne of Tutankhamen. From the sixth century BCE until the Roman era it
was sufcient of a rarity to be valued highly like gold
temrh, as in 20.18, is exchange, from hmr.
paz is known as the nest of gold, as indicated by LXX at 1 Kgs 10.18, where
zh mz (from pzaz) is rendered chrusos dokimos, well-approved gold.
18. rm, a substance in which the Edomites trafcked (Ezek. 27.16), hence
reasonably associated with the Red Sea, is probably coral, and g, which is
a hapax legomenon in the OT, suggests Ass. algame, or rock-crystal.
The context suggests that MT mee may be emended to mee (price; cf.
misa herke, the price of your assessment in Lev. 27.23), but the
consonants of MT may be retained and read me, cognate with Arab. maaka
(to grasp, hold, contain); cf. mee zera (Ps. 126.6), which L. Khler (1945:
59-61) explains as a bag of seed (so Tur-Sinai).
pennm are not pearls, as Rashi thought, since in Lam. 4.7 they are red; they
are either red coral, the word possibly alluding to Arab. corals branching
growth (cf. Arab. fananu[n], branch) or rubies.
19. piea is always rendered topaz in LXX.
21. The parallelism with indicates that MT y should possibly be emended
to ayyh (beasts); cf. 37.8 and the more common ayya hadeh (the
wild beasts).
22. Note the personication of aaddn and mwe. The latter is personied,
and indeed deied, as the inveterate enemy of Baal in the highly dramatic Baal
myth of Ras Shamra.
23. darkh (lit. its way) means here the way to it.
24. On text of v. 24b see Textual Note.
25. tikkn (he measured, adjusted) and middh (measurement), from
ma, recalls the famous passage on creation in Isa. 40.12:
m-ma beoal mnym (so 4QIsa)
wemayim bazzere tikkn
Who meted out the waters of the sea in the hollow of his hand,
And measured out the heavens with a span?
26. The association of Wisdom with the divine control of the seasons in vv.
26-27 recalls the association of Wisdom with Gods ordering of the elements
in Prov. 8.27-30.
1
The Book of Job
349
A decree for the rain may refer to the seasonal rains, the heavy rains of
early winter (the former rain of the OT) and the light rain of late winter and
early spring (the latter rain). This has been taken to indicate the Palestinian
origin of the Book of Job, but the high country of Edom also enjoys those
rains and the Hejaz has at least the expectancy of rain at the same season as
Palestine though it does not always materialize.
In v. 26b dere, in parallelism with q (decree, prescription), may denote
a xed or regular course (cf. on 24.4), but in the same phrase weere laazz
ql in 38.25, dere means way. In 28.26 the ambiguous term course may
be preferred, with the implication of regulation.
The meaning of azz is uncertain. Here and at 35.25; Zech. 10.1; Ben Sira
35.26 it is associated with rain, but also with thunder (ql). A connection
with forked lightning (cf. Arab. azza, to notch) has been suggested (G.B.
Gray 1921: I, 243; II, 197-98). If this were correct the association with rain
would recall the saying of the modern Arab peasant al-baraq almatu lmaar (the lightning is the announcement of the rain). But azza in Arab.
also means to speak roughly, hence azz ql may mean the rumble of
thunder (so Dhorme, Hlscher, Mowinckel).
27. rh recalls Gods consideration of his creation at its various stages in
Gen. 1.12.4. The Arab. nuance of considering as well as seeing in the Arab.
cognate is present also here.
sippar may have here the literal meaning to count or assess.
aqrh (lit. searched her out) means probably examined her potentialities, as one would do with a new instrument, which in effect Wisdom was in
Gods creation (Prov. 8.23ff.).
The parallelism with rh indicates the emendation of MT henh to
e
h nh (so Dhorme, Mowinckel, Pope).
28. This verse, which is markedly prosaic after the sublime poem on Wisdom,
and incorporates a quotation, though not quite verbatim, from the sapiential
tradition (Ps. 111.10; Prov. 1.7; 3.7; 16.6), has been taken as an editorial gloss.
Actually the conception of omh is quite different from that in the poem,
connoting not the intelligent master-plan of the Creator, but, as is indicated by
yira anay circumspect conduct, the objective of the amm in their
practical task of education and the due response of all to God as nr (one to
be dreaded or revered). The verse may be an addition by a sage (m),
conscious of the signicance of his profession, to counter any discouragement
which the poem on the inaccessibility of Gods Wisdom might have caused,
by stating that there was nevertheless a wisdom attainable by humans through
reverential and conscientious response (yirh) to God as nr. Lvque in
his excellent study of wisdom in all its connotations (1920: 607ff.) nds the
connection between the two orders of wisdom in the poem and the addendum
in v. 28 in that degree of the wisdom of the Creator that he reveals
1
350
particularized in the Law as the denition of a practical response to God (pp.

648f.). The explicit identication of Wisdom with the Law, to be sure, is not
made until Ben Sira (c. 190 BCE), after which it is familiar in Jewish Wisdom,
but it is clearly implied in the postexilic Wisdom Psalms 19.8 (EVV 7) and
119.97ff. any for Yahweh, exceptional in the poetic part of Job, has been
taken as evidence of a redactional addendum. This is possible, but it may well
be by the author of the poem himself, rounding out his poem on Divine
Wisdom by a sapiential citation expressing the conception of practical wisdom
which the sages represented in their effort to commend social order. We would
see also in the relation of social wisdom and conduct to cosmic Wisdom in
vv. 24-27 reection of the culmination of creation in humanity and what is
expected of it before its presumption in exceeding the limit of reverent
response (yira elhm, fear of God) in seeking to match God in knowledge (to which we would relate bnh in v. 28b).
Job 29
JOBS REVIEW OF HIS FORMER PROSPERITY
Jobs challenge to God in his oath of purgation (ch. 31), preceded by his
account of his enjoyment of the divine favour and the benets which his
community had shared (ch. 29), which serves to emphasize by contrast his ruin
(ch. 30), are to be taken as a unity. Chapters 2930 particularly recall the
picture of past prosperity in Ps. 44.2-9 (EVV 1-8) as a foil to the Plaint of the
Community in vv. 10-20 (EVV 9-19) and the favour to the Davidic king in Ps.
89.20-38 (EVV 19-37) followed by the Plaint of the royal sufferer in vv. 39-52
(EVV 38-51). In the context of the forensic aspect of this appeal to God in
vv. 2931 the account of his great social potential (v. 29) nullied by his ruin
(v. 30) is tantamount to an accusation of his divine adversary. Further, in the
convention of the Plaint of the Sufferer an important element is the call for, or
expectation of, a reassuring divine response in oracle or intervention (e.g. Ps.
44.24-26 [EVV 23-25]). To be sure, this is not voiced in Jobs plaint in ch. 30,
though his wish for a restoration of his prosperity in 29.1-8 might amount to as
much, and particularly his statement, This is my ardent desire; let the
Almighty answer me (31.35). Be this as it may, his oath of purgation invites,
indeed demands, divine response, which in fact materializes in the Divine
Declaration (38.1ff.), though in rebuke rather than in reassurance.
The chapter may be divided according to its subject matter into six strophes
of unequal length: vv. 1-6, 7-10, 21-25, 14-17, 11-13, 18-20. The rst, introduced as a wish, depicts the material and family blessings Job had enjoyed, the
second (vv. 7-10) and the third (vv. 21-25) amplifying this by describing the
social prestige he enjoyed and shared. The fourth strophe (vv. 14-17) sustains
the gure of the king in v. 25 by the theme of righteousness (eeq), and justice
(mip) as Jobs distinctive roles (cf. the Royal Psalm 72.1ff.; see Caquot
1961) and describes how Job discharged responsibility to society. The fth
strophe (vv. 11-13) continues this theme and depicts the popular approval of
Jobs use of his inuence, and the chapter ends (vv. 18-20) with the hope Job
had had of a continuance of Gods blessings.
Other arrangements of the text have been proposed (e.g. vv. 1-10, 21-25,
11-20; so Dhorme, Mowinckel, Fohrer, Pope). But we submit that this fails to
do justice to the signicance of the robe and turban of righteousness (v. 14) as
reecting the technical language and imagery of the ideology of kingship (vv.
21-25), which seems to demand that vv. 14-17 should be read immediately
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Job 29. Jobs Review of his Former Prosperity
after vv. 21-25, where Stevenson places them, though apparently not under
this consideration.
Chapter 29
1.
And Job represented his case afresh and said:
2.
Oh to be as in the months of old!

As in the days when God watched over me,
When he made his lamp shine1 over my head,
And by his light I walked through the darkness,
As I was in my autumn days,
When God set a screen2 about my tent,
When as yet the Almighty was with me,
And my children stood3 around about me.
Then my nomads had abundance of curds,4
And the rock (press) exuded rivers of oil.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
14.
15.
16.
17.
11.
12.
1
When I went out to the gate in honour,

Or took my seat in the public place,
The young men saw me and withdrew,
The aged rose up and stood;
Notables refrained from speaking,
And laid their hand on their mouth.
The voice of the nobles was tied up,5
And their tongue clave to the roof of their mouth.
They listened to me and were in suspense,
And kept silent for my counsel.
After I spoke they did not speak again.
My word fell upon them like raindrops,
And they waited for me as for the rain,
Open-mouthed as for the latter rain.
If I smiled upon them then indeed6 they gained condence,
If my face was bright7 they beamed.8
I chose their government and sat as chief,
I lived like a king in prestige.
9Where I led them they let themselves be led.9
I put on righteousness and it clothed me,
Justice10 like a robe and turban.
I was eyes to the blind,
And feet to the lame;
I was a father to the poor,
And I searched out the case11 of the stranger.
But I shattered the fangs of the wicked,
And rescued12 the prey from his teeth.
Whenever the ear heard it blessed me,
And when the eye saw it testied its approval of me,
For I rescued the poor when he cried,
Even the orphan and the helpless.
The Book of Job

13.
The blessing of him who was about to perish came upon me,
And I made the widows heart to sing.
18.
So I thought, like a reed-cane13 will I thrive,14

Like a palm-tree15 multiply my days,
My root spreading free to the water,
And the dew settling at night on my branches.
My dignity fresh within me,
And my strength16 renewed in my hand.
19.
20.
353
Textual Notes on Chapter 29

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
Reading bahill with T for MT behill. See Commentary ad loc.

Reading bes (cf. 1.10), with LXX, Sym. and S for bes, nal k being corrupted to
d in the square script. MT so, however, may possibly be cognate with Arab. adda
(to protect). See Commentary ad loc.
Reading me metri causa, assuming displacement of mdw to v. 6b, where it is
superuous to the metre, with subsequent corruption to imm.
Reading beemh with certain Heb. MSS, LXX, T and V for MT bemh.
Reading nek for MT neb and omitting w as a dittograph. See Commentary
ad loc.
Reading the asseverative enclitic le for MT l. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading wer pnay for MT wer pnay, assuming metathesis of r and w.
Reading leyal for MT l yappl, assuming scribal misunderstanding of le
enclitic, metathesis of l and y, and the corruption of g to w, w to n and b to p in the
square script.
Reading baaer lm yinn, proposed by Herz, for MT kaaer alm
yenam. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading mip with LXX and S for mip.
Conjecturing r for MT r.
Conjecturing el for MT al. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading qneh for MT qinn, assuming corruption of h to y in the Old Heb. script.
Reading egga, from naa, for MT ew. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading kenaal with LXX and V for MT wekl, assuming corruption of k to w and
n to k in the Old Heb. script. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading qe for MT weqat.
1. It has been suggested (e.g. Hlscher) that the reading wayyse iyyb e
mel (and Job represented his case afresh) instead of the customary and
Job answered, or spoke up and said is secondary, occasioned by misplacement of text in chs. 2527, Job being the last speaker before the insertion of
the poem on Wisdom (ch. 28). In chs. 2931, however, Job, having nished
his debate with his friends, makes a fresh statement of his situation, to which
we refer the heading in MT. ml means lit. likeness, hence generally an
example, good or bad, which sets people talking and affords an illustration of
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354
moral principles. It is thus used of a parable, which reects reality, of a

proverb, which by simile, metaphor or antithesis emphasizes certain features
of the actual situation. In Jobs concluding monologue it is the representation
of his actual situation brought into sharp focus.
2. ke is used pregnantly as a particle of comparison, but with reference to time
attached to yare-qeem and yem (GKC, 118u). The use of a construct
before an adjectival clause in kym elah yimern should be noted (cf. GKC,
130d). m yittenn is tantamount to m yittenn ehyeh (would that I were).
3. For MT behill we should probably read bahill, contraction of behahill, the
innitive construct of the Hiphil of hlal (to shine) with the preposition and
pronominal sufx (so T, Beer, Duhm, Dhorme). The conception of the lamp as
symbolizing the presence of God is known in the cult at Shiloh (1 Sam. 3.3)
and possibly also in the Temple of Solomon, the free-standing pillars Jachin
and Boaz supporting re-cressets (1 Kgs 7.15) according to W.R. Smith (1889:
287-89), W.F. Albright (1942: 18ff.), and H.G. May (ibidem: 88; 1942: 19ff.);
cf. Isa. 60.2; Ps. 50.2 (EVV 1). It is used guratively for Gods abiding favour
in the quotation of a proverb in 18.5 and in 2 Sam. 22.29 = Ps. 18.29 (EVV 28).
he may be a circumstantial, or adverbial, accusative or a direct accusative of that through which one walks, which is unusual but attested; cf. Deut.
1.19, wannle kol-hammibr, and Deut. 2.7; 2 Sam. 2.9.
4. S in rendering MT orp (my shame) gives quite the opposite sense from
that demanded by the context, obviously thinking of the more familiar erph
(reproach). Theod., Sym. and V render my youth, which has suggested the
emendation pir (my bloom, so Volz, Budde, Hlscher). Fohrer translates
Frhzeit not, however, in the sense of youth, which does not accord with
Jobs family all about him. He recognizes re, well attested in the OT
meaning harvest or harvest-time, but takes it as a homonym, but without
attesting the meaning he adopts (1963: 402). Harvest-time, guratively
maturity, seems the obvious sense in view of Jobs family, his prosperity and
his standing which even the notables respect. In v. 4b al ohol supports the
emendation s for MT s (intimate council). The reading s in 1.10 and
3.23 further supports the emendation, which makes D.W. Thomass view that
s is a homonym of s (council) from a root sad cognate with Arab.
adda meaning in the IVth Form to avert and in the VIIIth Form to veil
oneself unnecessary, though it remains interesting.
6. If halay means goings or steps (cf. Nah. 2.6; Ps. 68.25; Prov. 31.27;
Hab. 3.6), and ra means to wash, the expression is very strange, though
perhaps reminiscent of the Blessing of Asher in Deut. 33.24, who would dip
his foot in oil. Dahood (UHP, p. 60) suggests that it may refer to a footsore
traveller, and, reading
1
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355
bire halay beemh wesr

q amay pale man,
he translates
When my feet were bathed in cream and balsam,
And rivers of oil owed over my legs.
We suggest that both ra and halay have been misunderstood, and take
ras as cognate with Akk. rau (to overow) or Arab. raaa (to be
cheap and so plentiful). halh is used of a caravan or travelling company of merchants in 6.19. We suggest that it denotes Jobs nomad herdsmen
wandering in search of pasture. In v. 6b we would see in ome (for MT
imm) a complementary parallel to halay, the noun denoting the chiefs
headquarters as distinct from the scattered gratings of his herds during the
season of pasture. This was envisaged as a settled land where the hills were
terraced for olive trees and other fruits. emh is the butter and buttermilk
churned by the Bedouin women, whose constant occupation is rocking their
skin containers. The conception of the rock pouring forth or exuding oil (see
above on the verb q on 28.2) recalls Deut. 32.13, and he gave him to suck
honey out of the rock and oil out of the inty rock, but r may rather denote
the heavy stone olive press (see above on 24.11).
7. qere is used in the OT denoting city only in Prov. 8.3; 9.3, 14; 11.11, and
possibly here, but is regularly used in the Ras Shamra texts. The gate above
the city is dubious, notwithstanding Dhormes explanation of the main gate as
a high fortication dominating the city, which would certainly be out of place
in the home envisaged for Job. We would see al-qere as parallel to m,
the latter denoting the place or posture of honour recognized by the old men,
who stand up deferentially. Thus we take qere as the innitive construct of
yqar (to be honourable), as probably in the Ras Shamra text Gordon UT
52.3, ytnm qrt llyn(m) (let them give honour to the exalted ones). re is
the broad, relatively empty space about the main gate, still the place of
business and gossip and occasional markets in the Arab towns.
8. neb might mean hid themselves, but here means made themselves
inconspicuous, withdrew; cf. Isa. 26.20 where the Qal of the verb is used
parallel to b baar (go into your chambers).
On y see on 12.12.
9. rm is used of local notables; cf. those of the Israelite town of Succoth in
Transjordan in the time of Gideon (Judg. 8.6, 14).
er bemillm, lit. they set restraint upon words, with be of the object
restrained, is analogous to the expression ar bea kol-reem (he set a
restraint on all wombs) in Gen. 20.18.
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356
In v. 9b the putting of the hand to the mouth (cf. 21.5; 40.4; Judg. 18.19;
Mic. 7.16; Prov. 30.32) might denote silence, but it might also be a gesture of
deference; cf. the attitude of the worshipper, or listener, before the god, for
example in the Hammurabi stele, or of a person at court; cf. a passage in the
Ras Shamra Legend of King Krt (Gordon UT 125, 41-42): q apk byd (Hold
thy hand over thy nose, lit. take thy nose in thy hand); (b)r(l)tk bm ymn
(Thy right hand over thy throat, lit. thy throat in thy right hand). It also indicated in Egyptian legal convention that one had no further argument (Couroyer
1960).
10. MT neb in ql-nem neb is suspect, partly because the verb in
its known sense of hide or withdraw does not suit the subject ql, and partly
because a poet with the wealth of diction of the author of Job would not have
repeated the verb so soon after v. 3. Hence we propose the emendation nek,
with a word-play with ikkh (palate) in v. 10b. is not attested in Heb.,
but it is well known in Arab. (akaa) meaning to tie, or tighten a knot.
21-25. Verses 21-25, continuing the theme of the deference of even the
notables to Job, is displaced in MT.
21. In weyill the verb is yal (to wait), being used in the Piel; the
daghesh in l is daghesh forte affectuosum, to preserve and emphasize the
quantity of the vowel in the principal pause (GKC, 20i).
22. For MT der some commentators (e.g. Merx, Budde, Duhm, Hlscher),
read dabber, as in 21.3, but this is not necessary.
nh is a denominative verb from enayim, and means to double, repeat,
do again; cf. Mishnah, the re-application of the Law.
na signies the dropping of rain (cf. 36.27), introducing the gure of the
expectancy of rain in v. 23.
23. This apt gure reects the intense expectancy of the early rains (Deut.
11.14; Jer. 5.24) about October or November after the long summer drought,
which rell the cisterns and soften the hard crust of the dry earth and make
cultivation possible again. Verse 23b refers to the light rains (malq), the
latter rains at the end of winter and early spring, which fall when the corn is
forming the ear. It is important that the latter rains come at this stage of the
growth before the siroccos of late April and May nally check the growth.
The opening (par) of the mouth denotes eager expectancy; cf. Ps.
119.131.
24. Verse 24a and b are conditional sentences, introduced respectively by the
imperfect and perfect without the conditional particle in the protasis. In MT the
negative l yaamn has excited the suspicion of some commentators (e.g.
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The Book of Job
357
Budde, Bickell, Beer, Duhm, Peake, Hlscher, Stevenson, Mowinckel).

Retaining the negative, others translate If I smiled on them they would not
believe it, that is, they were transported beyond belief; cf. 9.16 (so Ball,
Dhorme, Peters, Pope, Terrien). But Stevenson rightly observes that this
would imply that Jobs favour was something unusual, which is quite the
opposite of what the context conveys. G.B. Gray takes l yaamn as the
imperfect of attendant circumstances, rendering I laughed at them when they
believed not, and goes on to interpret v. 24b as meaning that general despondency never affected Jobs cheerfulness; though grammatically possible, this
interpretation is somewhat forced, especially in v. 24a. Kissane takes v. 24a to
mean that Job laughed the people out of false counsel and false condence,
while he interprets v. 24b to mean that they did not fail to respond to his
cheerfulness, which is again possible if even more forced. Duhm, Budde,
Steuernagel, Mowinckel and Fohrer omit l in v. 24a as a dittograph of the
negative in v. 24b, with a similar interpretation to Kissanes in v. 24b.
Those interpretations ignore the phenomenon of the proclitic le with
asseverative force, which has also escaped the notice of the Masoretes, by
whose time it had fallen obsolete. It is, however, well known in Ugarit, and
commonly introduced the apodosis of a conditional sentence, as here. Regularly the Masoretes, expecting Classical Hebrew, assume that l with the nite
verb in the consonantal text is the negative l, possibly because the Canaanite
enclitic was vocalized lo. Thus in v. 24a we would read eaq elhem
leyaamn (If I smiled to them then indeed they gained condence). We take
r in v. 24b, emending to wer, as the verb in the protasis of a conditional
sentence without the conditional particle. But MT might be retained as the
innitive absolute with the force of the perfect. yappl may be a corruption of
yal, resulting in the reading wer nay leyal (and if my face shone
they fairly beamed); cf. 9.27; 10.10. G.R. Driver (1955: 88) would preserve
the consonants of MT l yappl, taking the latter word as a scribal misunderstanding of a hapax legomenon yaal (grow dark), rendering their darkness was dispelled, hence NEB lost their gloomy looks. l he would understand as introducing a rhetorical question without the interrogative particle.
For the conception of the light of the face signifying favour; cf. Num. 6.2, 5;
Ps. 4.7 and particularly Prov. 16.15a, For the light of a kings face is life.
25. In v. 25a darkm means their government as in Ugaritic (see on 26.14).
On the Ben Asher pointing of ear, with hateph pathah under b before the
guttural, see GKC, 10g. In this particular context we have taken san in the
familiar sense to dwell, but understanding the pregnant sense of being rmly
established; we admit that it may reect the status of Ass. zukanu, a provincial
governor, familiar in Palestine in the Babylonian and Persian periods. Among
the troop (MT bagge) in conjunction with the swelling or abiding of a
king is suspect, and we propose that ge is cognate with Arab. jaddu(n)
(excellence or prestige). A third colon, like v. 25c, is always suspect as a
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358
gloss or a displacement unless it obviously ends a passage and may readily be

connected in sense with the preceding two cola. So in v. 25c MT ablm
yenam was taken to have been displaced from after wer pnay in v. 24b,
which was then translated and the light of my face comforted mourners(so
Budde, Bickell, Beer, Duhm, Peake, Richter, Stevenson). G.B. Gray, Mowinckel and Fohrer omit v. 25c as a gloss. But we submit that it is the last colon
of a tricolon which ends the passage on Jobs status among the elders and
notables (vv. 8-10, 21-25) before the passage on his protection of the destitute
(vv. 14-17, 11-13), thus punctuating the strophe, which it ends as it does often
in the Ras Shamra myths. The agreement of v. 25c and v. 25a and b is secured
by Herzs plausible emendation of MT kaaer alm yenam to kaaer
lm yinn (1900: 163), or, we consider, better, baaer lm yinn,
which the reading of Sym. supports (so Dhorme).
14-17, 11-13. These two strophes follow the reference to Jobs kingly prestige
in v. 25, and reect the Israelite tradition of the responsibilities of royalty; cf.
Ps. 72.1-4; Isa. 11.3-5 (see Introduction to ch. 29).
14. eeq is right, with here a moral connotation, which is properly secondary to the word, which means primarily that which is proper, right rather
than righteousness. mip is also primarily a neutral word, the regular government or rule which is imposed and upheld by a , the Ugaritic cognate of which, p, in the Ras Shamra texts is parallel to mlk (king). Hence
mip denotes primarily order and secondarily judgment. The meaning of
such words is to be determined from the context, though in Israel, which
admitted the rule of Yahweh, whose nature and will was revealed in the
Covenant and its religious and social obligations, the words had usually a
moral connotation. In the present context, which after the prototype of the
royal ideology emphasizes the responsibility of Job in society, both words
have certainly the moral connotation.
The conception of being clothed in right is familiar in Ps. 132.9. Clothing
and clothed may denote being in uniform, as Ahab and Jehoshaphat at the
gate of Samaria on the eve of their expedition to Ramoth-Gilead (1 Kgs
22.10), or it may denote the clothes of men of standing as distinct from the
stripped workman or half-clad pauper. In any case it denotes the characteristic
of Job, from which he was known plainly to the people and which he proud to
exhibit; cf. Arab. mahara innu(n) (what a man shows undisguisedly,
lit. what a man has on his back, as distinct from what he has in his belly,
i.e. conceals, mabana).
mel is the overcloak (Arab. abbyatu[n]) that is worn by men of status or
in leisure.
n is the headdress of a king (Isa. 62.3) or of the high priest (Zech. 3.5);
cf. minee of the priests turban in Exod. 28.4ff., where the insignia proper
was a golden ower fastened on it (Exod. 28.36-38). The nature of n as a
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The Book of Job
359
turban is clear from its derivation from the verb na (to wind, or wrap;
Lev. 16.4; Isa. 22.18). Again the turban carefully wound is a status symbol, as
in Islam today.
15. pissa denotes limping, as of the lame Mephibosheth (2 Sam. 19.27).
The association of the verb with the Arab. cognate fasaa (to be dislocated)
expresses the use of the verb to describe the jerky ritual dance of the prophets
of Baal round the altar on Carmel (1 Kgs 18.21), perhaps on half-bent knees
(al-et hasseippm) (de Vaux 1941: 9). The association of this verb with
pesa (Passover) is doubtful.
16. The description or Job as father to the poor recalls the claim of Hammurabi in the epilogue to his famous Code (ANET, 178).
The usage of l-yat, which is properly a relative clause with the antecedent and the relative particle omitted, describes either a gr, or resident alien
in the community, who depended upon such as Job for his rights, or one who
was not a kinsman (cf. ma [Qere], kinsman, in Ruth 2.1). In this case
Jobs sense of justice was not conned to those whom convention strictly
bound him to vindicate.
17. mealle, from tla (to gnaw), denotes the incisor teeth, particularly of
an animal (Joel 1.6; Ps. 58.7), and, as here, is parallel to innayim (teeth) in
Joel 1.6 and Prov. 30.14. The conception of the wicked devouring persons as
prey (ere) is familiar in the Psalms; cf. Ps. 124.6 and Job 4.10. The gure of
the breaking of the teeth of the oppressor is peculiarly at home in the
declaration of faith in the Plaint of the Sufferer (e.g. Ps. 3.8).
If MT of v. 17b is correct this would be the one instance in the OT of hil
in the sense of to deliver, hence el is suggested, the verb meaning to
draw out, as of a sword from its sheath. G.R. Driver, however (1955: 35)
defends MT, citing Arab. alaka (to save oneself, which also in the IInd Form
means to draw a sword from the sheath). The verb has possibly a Phoenician
cognate.
11. k has a temporal signicance, here whenever, as in 1.5; it also introduces
v. 11b.
In v. 11b the verb h (to attest call to witness) with the direct object is
rare, but intelligible, the person being the object of testimony. The verb is so
used of evidence against in 1 Kgs 21.10, 13, where the more common usage
would be h be.
12. The succour of the widow and orphan was the peculiar concern of the king
in the legends of the Canaanite kings Dnil and Krt in the Ras Shamra texts
Gordon UT 1 Aqht 31, 160, and UT, 127, 46-49:
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360
ltdn dn almnt
ltp qr np
ltdy m l dl
lpnk ltlm ytm
bd kslk almnt
Thou dost not judge the case of the widow,

Nor decide the suit of the oppressed.
Thou dost not drive away those who prey upon the poor,
Before thee thou dost not feed the fatherless;
The widow is behind thy back.
LXX has an interesting reading of v. 12a: For I delivered the poor man from
the potentate, reading mia. This word means generally noble (cf. 34.19),
with the nuance of generous, which may be connected with Ugaritic y (to
give); cf. Isa. 32.5, where a is parallel to n with the same connotation.
In the Royal Psalm 72.12 in a bicolon of the same purport and with close
verbal correspondence LXX, S and Jerome read mia for MT meawwa. MT
in both cases, however, is to be preferred, with the familiar motif of hearing
the cry (awh) of the oppressed.
18. The rendering of MT might be: And I said, I will expire with my nest and
my days will be as numerous as the sand . im-qinn in the rst colon has
been taken to mean with my nestlings, a somewhat unlikely expression,
which is not attested of a human family elsewhere in the OT. LXX renders v.
18a as But I said, My life will reach old age, which suggests that MT qinn is
the end of zeqnay (my old age). Dhorme read imm, which he construed
with wmer (I said to myself; cf. this use of im with the pronominal sufx
in 10.13, where imme is parallel to billee), reading wmer imm
zqn ewa (so Saydon 1961: 252; Pope). It must be admitted that this gives
an excellent parallel to v. 18b (MT), And my days will be as numerous as the
sand, though in view of the gure of a growing plant in the following verse
we have some reserve. Herz (1913: 345) proposed that qn was an Egyptian
loanword meaning strength, which was accepted by G.R. Driver (1955: 85)
and Terrien (1963). Actually if this is the meaning of 18a there is no need to
invoke Egyptian, since qn is attested in the Ras Shamra texts (e.g. Gordon UT
62, 4 and 67 VI, 20), where it signies, as has been recognized in Job 31.22,
the shoulder socket which might well, like arm (zera), signify strength.
im-qn might then be read, meaning with my strength unimpaired. If MT of
v. 18b is correct then Dhormes reading of 18a or our proposed modication
of Herzs interpretation would be acceptable. This, however, depends on the
connection of v. 18 with the gure in v. 19, and on the reliability of the MT
reading kal in v. 18b. There was a Rabbinic reading kal, like the
phoenix, b. Sanh. 108b), with an allusion to the legendary phoenix, which has
been adopted by certain later commentators (e.g. Hitzig, Ewald, Dillmann,
Friedrich Delitzsch, Budde, Duhm, Peake, Hlscher, Stevenson, Mowinckel,
Terrien, Fohrer). This would, if genuine, support MT im-qinn. But it is suspiciously like a secondary tradition derived from the LXX translation of v. 18b,
like a palm-stem (phoinix) I shall live a long time. This indicates a Heb.
original kenaal (like a palm-tree; cf. Arab. nalu[n]). This reading was
known to Jerome, as is evident from his commentary and the Vulgate and is
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361
adopted by Ball and Kissane. We consider that it may represent a genuine preMasoretic variant and perhaps even the original text. The fact that nalu(n) is
the regular Arab. word for palm-tree, which is regularly tmr in Heb., is no
objection, since it is actually attested in the OT, though only once more (Num.
24.6). We consider this reading, which is not far from MT, more natural in
view of the sequel, which refers to the roots and branches of a tree, which has
so far not been mentioned in MT.
In v. 18a S retains a double reading, translating I will deliver the poor
people, implying a reading am n a for MT im-qinn ewa (and will
nish as a reed), rendering a Hebrew text weim qneh ewa, and this
affords a clue to the restoration of the couplet. If we read kenaal (like a
palm-tree) in v. 18b, im in v. 18a would naturally be the comparative preposition, a sense which is attested for im in Proverbs. The standard of comparison would naturally be a plant, like a palm-tree, and from v. 19a, one which
throve in water. This would suggest the reading qneh for MT qinn, with
which S was familiar. The problem then remains is MT ewa. As a pure
conjecture we might suggest qneh gm (a reed which sucks up water; cf.
Gen. 24.17, hamin n mea-mayim, let me drink a little water), but there
is nothing in this reading to correspond to the distinctive letter in MT ewa.
On the hint of the rst variant of S we might read iwwa (will spread
myself), the verb ya being cognate with Arab. waia (to be wide), but
is too distinctive to be readily corrupted to w or g. Our conclusion is that for
MT ewa we should retain the consonants, but read egga from na, a
cognate of Arab. najaa (to thrive as beasts on pasture, manjau[n]). So in v.
18a we read im-qneh egga (I shall thrive like the reed-cane).
19. The use of the passive Qal pa is interesting, meaning let go free; cf.
Gen. 24.32 (Piel) of camels loosed at the end of a journey.
yln (lit. shall spend the night) is very apt in the case of dew.
20. This bicolon is full of ambiguity. qat in v. 20b immediately suggests my
bow, which has suggested the emendation of MT ke in v. 20a to kn
(my javelin, so Hoffmann). The sense of a as parallel to taal (to be
renewed, or ever fresh), does not suit kn, nor yet ke (my bow
handle), which was proposed by G.R. Driver (1955: 85-86), citing Arab.
kabidu(n) (the centre-piece, or handle of a bow). The Hiphil of la is
found in 14.7 of a tree renewing itself in fresh shoots, but while it would be
expected that the gure of the tree should be continued from v. 19, this does
not seem possible in the text. We claim that after the gure of the reed cane
and the palm-tree the poet returns to the actual subject of his dignity (ke)
and his strength (reading qe for MT qat, lit. hardness). There is probably
a similar misunderstanding of qt in Gen. 49.24:
watte ben qat
wayyzz zer yyw
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362
Here qe (my strength) is a better parallel to zer yy. Though the poet
has returned to literalism in ke, he bridges the gulf of the gures by using
a and taal, which might refer either to renewal of dignity and strength
or of vegetation.
Job 30
JOBS PLAINT
With various components of the Plaint of the Sufferer Job voices his lamentation. The distinctive elements of the prototype, however, are scrambled
because of the contrast with the prosperity and status he had enjoyed by Gods
favour. Thus in the rst strophe (vv. 1-2, 9-10) Jobs contempt for those who
are alienated by his suffering (vv. 1-2, 9-10), probably secondarily amplied
by an independent poem in vv. 3-8 (so Fohrer, who includes v. 2), points the
contrast to Jobs status among the notables in 29.7-11, which the sufferer felt
so keenly. Having struck this note, Job continues in the second strophe (vv.
11-14) with the theme of the alienation of those who too readily conclude that
his suffering betokens sin. Their estrangement is described in the gure of
military assault (vv. 12-14; cf. Ps. 62.4f. [EVV 3f.]). In the third strophe (vv.
15-19) Job laments his fall from high standing, neh (v. 15b) to dust and
ashes (v. 19), noting his bodily afiction (vv. 17f. in the language of the Plaint
of the Sufferer with particular reference to his own actual afiction; cf. 2.7f.).
The fourth strophe (vv. 20-23) opens with the cry of the sufferer to God (v.
20), but only to elaborate on his sufferings and his hopeless end, which he
imputes to God (vv. 21-23) in contrast to his free acknowledgment of the
divine favour in 29.2-5. In the context of Jobs oath of purgation, to which chs.
29 and 30 are the prelude, this is an accusation.
In the second part of Jobs statement (vv. 24-31), the rst strophe (vv. 2427) emphasizes his unmerited suffering in language that reects Pss. 35.13f.
and 7.5f. (EVV 4f.), where it is the declaration of the innocent sufferer. In its
present context in the forensic convention it anticipates Jobs oath of purgation
(ch. 31). The nal strophe (vv. 28-31) is in the convention and gure of the
Plaint of the Sufferer.
Verses 3-8, which with Fohrer we take to be a secondary poetic insertion
with the same antecedents as 24.5ff., describes miscreants who, for some
reason, have been scourged out of the land (vv. 5-8) and must live as pariahs
beyond the settled land on which they prey stealthily as brigands (vv. 5-7).
This seems obviously a digression in Jobs statement in vv. 1, 9-10, which
justies Fohrers opinion that it is a citation, with v. 2 also possibly secondary.
Job 30. Jobs Plaint
364
Chapter 30
1.
2.
3
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
But now I am mocked by men

Younger in years than myself,
Whose fathers I should have disdained
To set with the dogs of my ocks.
Of what signicance to me would the strength of their hands have been,
Men whose strength even for their own sakes had perished?
Through want and hard hunger.

They gnaw the roots1 of the dry ground,
The land of the wastes2 of the wilderness.
They pick the salt-wort and the leaves3 of bushes,
And roots of wild broom to warm themselves.4
They are driven out from the body of the community;5
Men shout at them as at a thief.
On the slopes6 of the wadis they live,
Among the caves of the earth and rocks;
Among bushes they bray,
Where thistles grow they are banded together,
Sons of a churl, without repute,
Who have been scourged out of the land.
But now I have become something for them to sing about,
Even a byword7 for them.
They abhor me; they withdraw far from me;
And do not refrain from spitting in my face.
Since God has loosened my tent-cord8 and humbled me,
They have cast off restraint even in my presence.
They raise9 places for battering-rams10 against me,11
They raise12 their destructive siege-causeways.
They break up my path to make me fall;13
They attack;14 no one restrains them.15
As through a wide breach they come;
At the place they make the rain they roll on.
Terrors are turned16 upon me,
My honour is driven away17 as by the wind,
And my wellbeing has passed away like a cloud.
18My life within me is poured out;
Days of afiction have taken hold of me.
At night my bones are hotter19 than a cauldron;20
And my veins21 have no rest.
With great violence afiction grips me as22 my garment,
Constricting me about like the collar of my tunic.
It has sent me down23 into the mire and confusion,24
And I am made like dust and ashes.
I cry to you but you answer me not;
I stand, and you do not heed25 me.
The Book of Job

21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
365
You turn cruel to me,

With all your strength you wreak your animosity against me,
You lift me up and make me ride the wind,
And you dissolve me in a rainstorm.26
For I know certainly that you will bring me to death,
Even to the place certainly appointed for all living.
But to any who made a request27 I would put out my hand,28
If one cried in his calamity to me.29
Did I not weep for him whose day was hard?
Did not my soul grieve for the needy?
30
If I looked for good evil came,
And if I expected light darkness came.
My inside is made to boil without remission,
Days of afiction confront me.
I have gone about black, but not with the sun,
I have stood up in the assembly, calling for help.
I have been brother to the jackals,
And the companion of ostriches.
My skin is black with scorching,31
And my bones are burnt with fever.
So my lyre is turned to mourning,
And my pipe to the voice of mourners.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
1
Inserting iqqer, possibly omitted after reqm. See Commentary ad loc.

Reading m h for MT eme h. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading al as plural of leh.
Reading leummm for MT lamm.
Adding anm metri causa, omitted through haplography before yer (pausal)
in the Old Heb. script. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading baar for MT ber. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading leml for MT lemillh.
Reading yir (Qere) with S and T for MT yir.
Reading yqm for MT yqm, y being corrupted to w in the stage of the script
represented by the Qumran MSS.
Reading mid for MT pir. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading lay for MT al-ymn. See Commentary ad loc.
Omitting MT ralay ill. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading lehaww for MT lehaww. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yaal for MT yl.
Reading r for MT zr.
Reading hohpe for MT hohpa.
Reading tinn after LXX for MT tird, with corruption of n to r in the Old Heb.
script.
Omitting weatth as a dittograph after yeu.
Reading niqqe for MT niqqar, with corruption of d to r in the square script and
omission of nal w by haplography before m in the Old Heb. script.
366
Job 30. Jobs Plaint
20. Reading mal, for MT mly. See Commentary ad loc.

21. Reading aqray with LXX for MT reqay.
22. Reading yip kile with LXX for MT yiapp le, understanding the object
as the pronominal sufx of the parallel verb in v. 18b doing double duty, as
regularly in Ugaritic poetry, with omission of k after s in the Old Heb. script.
23. Reading hrn for MT hrn.
24. Reading lemer lehomr metri causa. See Commentary ad loc.
25. Reading wel tibnn with one Heb. MSS and V for MT wattibnen.
26. Reading teh for MT tiyyh (Qere).
27. Reading leay beh for MT l-e. See Commentary ad loc.
28. Reading ela for MT yila, being corrupted to y in the Old Heb. script.
29. Reading l yesawwa for MT lhen a, y of l being corrupted to h in the Old Heb.
script, and y to n in the last stage of the script.
30. Omitting MT k with LXX, S and V metri causa.
31. Reading mal for MT mly. See Commentary ad loc.
1-8. It has been maintained that vv. 2-8 (introduced by v. 1, which, it is
claimed, is editorial) is part of another passage in Job, perhaps really belonging to Jobs speech in ch. 24, which is fragmentary (so Duhm, Bickell, TurSinai). Fohrer treats vv. 2-8 as a later insertion which breaks the sequence of
thought between vv. 1 and 9ff. The passage is indeed an embarrassing interruption of the argument, and may well be part of a citation of part of a Plaint
of the Sufferer, from which such adaptations are regularly made in the Book of
Job, often at greater length than is strictly necessary for the argument. We
would admit v. 2, and take vv. 3-8 as one of those extended quotations,
perhaps secondary to the Book of Job.
1. The reference in v. 1c and d may be to the order of preference at a Bedouin
guest-meal, where the honoured guests and as many male adults as can sit at
meat are rst served, then poorer tribesmen and juniors, then servants and
women, the remains being gnawed by the dogs.
2. Dhorme rightly in our opinion defends MT lmmh ll, emphasizing l which
refers to Job at the height of his prestige when he was independent of the
support of such people, even if they had been strong, to say nothing of them in
such an enfeebled state. This suggests that the pronominal sufx in lm is
also emphatic, in antithesis to l, their strength, even for their own sakes
(lm) is perished. For this use of al with the pronominal sufx, cf. v. 16;
10.1; Pss. 42.6, 12; 43.5.
On kela, Syr. kela, see on 5.26.
3. kn is Aram., hunger, famine.
galm, which means sterile in 3.7 and 15.34, is best taken here in its
Arab. nuance as hard.
1
The Book of Job
367
beeser wen galm may be the rst colon of a tricolon, but is probably
the second colon of a bicolon, of which the rst colon has dropped out (so
Hlscher, Mowinckel).
LXX takes reqm as the Aram. verb they ee, but it is cognate rather of
the Syr. araq (to gnaw). The colon is short of a beat, which may be restored
by the inclusion of iqqer (roots, so Dhorme, Ball, Hlscher, Mowinckel,
Fohrer), which may well have been omitted by haplography after hreqm.
Alternatively the missing object of reqm may be ee (growth), which
might be omitted by haplography before iyyh. We prefer the former solution,
reading iqqer, a conscious word-play with reqm.
In eme h meh (Evening [or yesterday], ruin and desolation)
the simplest solution is to assume a dittograph of and read m h
meh (lit. mother of the waste and wilderness), a description of iyyh.
For a similar description of localities, cf. Umm Lak (Mother of Itch) near
Gaza and Umm Fam (Mother of Charcoal) near Megiddo.
4. The verb qa (to pluck) is found again in 8.12 and 24.24.
malla, rendered halima in LXX, Aq. and Theod., is salt-wort (so
Bochart, Dhorme, Fohrer, Pope).
If v. 4b is taken in strict parallelism with v. 4a, lamm might denote their
food (so G.B. Gray, Dhorme, Kissane, Weiser, Terrien). There is no evidence,
however, that the roots of desert broom (reem) were edible, but they were
known to be used to produce charcoal (Ps. 120.4), so for lamm we should
read leummm (to warm themselves; so Khler, Hlscher, Tur-Sinai,
Mowinckel, Fohrer, Gordis, Pope, Lindblom).
5. Dahoods suggestion that min-gw is a corruption of gm, known in Ugaritic
as with a shout, that is, aloud (1957: 318ff.), certainly gives a parallel to
yr in v. 5b, but it would be more convincing in an archaic passage in the
Psalms than in a relatively late sapiential passage that shows Aramaic inuence. It is in any case unnecessary. For the problematic gw Bochart proposed
gy, but there is no need to emend, since gw is attested in Phoenician (Cooke
1903: 33.2), Aram. and Syr., meaning community (so Hoffmann, Budde,
G.B. Gray, Dhorme, Hlscher, Kissane, Dhorme, Mowinckel, Fohrer, Pope,
Terrien). Another beat is required in this colon, and anm may be read,
having been omitted by haplography before yegr in the Old Heb. script.
6. The parallelism with r r (holes of the earth) supports the meaning
slopes of the wadis (ar nelm; cf. Arab. iru[n], the slope of a hill;
so Michaelis, Wetzstein, Dhorme, Hlscher, Mowinckel, Fohrer, Pope,
Terrien).
km (rocks) is found in Jer. 14.29 and in Ass. kap, and is familiar in
Aram.
1
368
Job 30. Jobs Plaint
7. On nhaq (to bray) see on 6.5. The people utter their cries to keep in
touch with one another.
rl denotes not nettles, but rather thistles, which grow over three feet
high (Dalman 1932: II, 318). The reference is possibly to the outcasts stalking
up to the settlement under cover of the thistles and bushes of the waste, where
they keep in touch by animal noises, preparatory to making a petty raid.
8. On nl see above on 2.10.
n is an Aram. form of Heb. nh (Hiphil and Hophal), found only here
and in Isa. 16.7; Prov. 15.13; 17.22; 18.14; cf. Tur-Sinai, who proposes to
emend to nire (they are cut off, so Dhorme).
9. nenh is primarily the accompaniment of psalms on a stringed instrument
and secondarily music or singing in general. Here, as in Lam. 3.14, where
nenh is parallel to eq (laughingstock), it means the theme of a song,
possibly improvised in jest in idle entertainment, as in the Plaint of the
Sufferer in Ps. 69.13 (EVV 12), where the word denotes drinking songs, in
which, as here, the innocent sufferer is mocked. As a parallel to nen in this
context millh (word) should probably be emended to ml (byword); cf.
17.6.
10. Note the assonance raq and rq. On the spitting in the face in the
familiar imagery of the Plaint of the Sufferer, cf. Isa. 50.6 and Job 17.6.
11. This is another ambiguous verse. Kethib yir (his cord) is read by LXX
and V, while Qere yir (my cord) is the reading followed by S and T, which
we adopt. yeer is taken by Dhorme as a tether, which would be a tting
parallel to resen (halter), but the sense is rather bowstring (cf. Judg. 16.7-9)
or tent-cord (cf. Jer. 10.20, where the form is mr). We prefer the latter.
pa (here intensive) is used of loosening (the knots of) bonds (12.18;
38.31; 39.5) or of the thongs of armour (1 Kgs 20.11). The passage might
possibly refer to the loosening of the bowstring, that is, the disarming of a
defeated enemy (so G.B. Gray, Terrien, Fohrer). The verb militates against
Mowinckels interpretation of God unloosing his bowstring to shoot at the
victim and against Kissanes view that the phrase means he stripped off my
excellency, a meaning which yir has in other contexts. We regard the reference to the loosening of the tent-peg to denote the condition of a homeless
castaway. This interpretation is possibly supported by the clich in the Ras
Shamra Baal myth referring to the discomture of a party as the up-rooting of
his tent-pegs (Gordon UT 129.17; 49.VI, 27-28). Here in the phrase lys alt
btk it is doubtful whether alt is ahl (tent) with the h elided or a cognate of
Arab. latu(n) (a spear, as the symbol of royalty).
In v. 11b resen (bridle; cf. Ps. 32.9; Isa. 30.28), signies restraint. We
should emphasize mippnay in this context as meaning even in my presence.
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The Book of Job
369
12. This verse is greatly overloaded in MT, and should probably be reduced to
a bicolon of three beats in each colon rather than treated as a defective
tricolon. al-ymn (on the right hand) is suspect in the absence of on the left
hand in v. 12b, unless it means that Jobs enemies dared to attack him on the
right hand, the sword hand, hence the side not protected by the shield. In view
of the military gure in the parallel colon it is unlikely that v. 12a refers to the
right hand as the place where the accuser stood (so Dhorme, citing Zech. 3.1
and Ps. 109.6), as in the Sharia courts in Saudi Arabia today, where plaintiff
and defendant stand side by side before the judge to symbolize the impartiality
of justice. Hence with Budde, Beer, Peake, Duhm, G.B. Gray, Hlscher,
Stevenson and Fohrer we read lay for MT al-ymn. To account for m and n
in MT ymn we conjecture m as the preformative of the following word.
Hence we propose to get rid of the embarrassing pira, which, even if it
meant brood, is quite out of place in a military metaphor, by emending it to
mid, the instrument for making a fracture (Arab. fadaa), a battering-ram,
or the ramp for its use; cf. the reference to the breach of a wall (pere) in v.
14a. MT yqm must then be emended to yqm (they mount a battering
ram against me, or they raise places for battering-rams against me). The
second in pira is a simple dittograph, or perhaps the corruption of nal t in
an original mid to .
If MT ralay ill is not the remnant of a defective colon referring to the
sending in of infantry (reading ral), the phrase may be eliminated as a
dittograph of ill in v. 11b.
lay in v. 12b should almost certainly be eliminated, leaving the couplet to
read:
lay mid yqm
weysll ore m
They raise places for battering-rams against me,
They raise their destructive siege-causeways.
Here we follow Hlscher and Fohrer. slelh is used literally as a siege-mound

in 2 Sam. 20.15; 2 Kgs 19.32 = Isa. 37.33; Jer. 6.8; Ezek. 4.2; 17.17; etc., and
the verb from which it is derived is used guratively in the imagery of the
Plaint of the Sufferer in 19.12. It must be admitted ore in the sense of
siege-causeways is strange, unprecedented to our knowledge and even suspect,
but nevertheless intelligible.
13. nes, a hapax legomenon, is a late orthographic variant for ne.
Dhorme has, in our opinion, rightly interpreted the breaking up of the path as
destruction of the escape route. Such a way out of a city under siege is
depicted in the exit from a postern through which people escape with what
they can salvage down the steep glais of Lachish on the reliefs of Sennacheribs siege from his palace at Nineveh (ANEP, pl. 373). The sing. in MT
lehaww (for my ruin) is attested only once, at Job 6.2 (Qere); cf. Pss. 5.10;
1
Job 30. Jobs Plaint
370
38.13; 52.4; 55.12; 57.2; 91.3; Prov. 19.13; etc., where the plural is used. Here
we may read lehaww (to cause me to fall), from hwh cognate with Arab.
hawa(y) (to fall). The military metaphor is sustained in yal (they attack;
cf. Num. 13.31; Judg. 1.1; 12.3; etc.), for MT yl (they prot), which yields
no feasible sense in the context. For MT zr (elsewhere in the OT helper)
r (one who refrains) is generally read after Dillmann, which is supported
by the direct object lm, with l as the nota accusativa. G.R. Driver would
defend MT, citing Arab. azara (to rebuke) and, with the preposition an
(from), to hinder (1936: 163); cf. Akk. ezeru (to scold). This is not supported by zar in any other passage in the OT and in the present passage there
is no word-play to occasion the citation of a less familiar homonym.
14. h in the OT is poetic and generally late, with regular Aram. and Arab.
cognates, but it is the regular verb to come in Ugaritic. For taat (the place
of) cf. Gordon, UT 1 Aqht 21; 2 Aqht V,6-9:
yt yb bap ?r
tt adrm dbgrn
He rose to take his seat at the entrance of the gate

In the place of the notables who are in the public place.
15. A tricolon is more usual among prevailing bicola at the end of a strophe
rather than the beginning, and v. 16a may well be a late addition.
If MT hohpa is correct it would be a case of the passive of the suppressed
agent. But it is probably a case of simple haplography, nal w being omitted
after k in the Old Heb. script.
For MT tird we may read tr (so Siegfried, Beer, Hontheim, Peters,
Hlscher, Fohrer) or tinnd (so Graetz, Duhm, Budde, Tur-Sinai, G.B.
Gray). We prefer the latter, the same verb being used of chaff driven away by
the wind in Ps. 1.4 or of smoke blown away by the wind in Ps. 68.3, and of a
driven leaf in Job 13.25.
yeut is used here in its primary sense of freedom from cramping
circumstances; cf. Arab. waia (to be wide). wi (generous) as an epithet
of Allah in the Quran suggests that in Jobs complaint of the impairing of his
social potential yeu may mean my largesse.
16. weatth gives an extra beat in the rst colon, and is probably to be omitted
as a dittograph after the end of yeu.
lay (on my account) indicates the object of Jobs lament; cf. 10.1; Ps.
42.6, 12; 43.5.
17. Dahood (1966: 230) has, in our opinion, solved the problem of this
difcult text in seeing that MT lay is al, a cognate of Arab. ?ala(y) (to
boil; cf. ?alayatu[n], cooking-pot), but we consider that he is wrong in
assuming without evidence a root qrr or qrh. We propose rather the emendation of MT niqqar to niqqe in scriptio defectiva, from yqa (to be kindled,
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The Book of Job
371
burn; cf. Arab. waqada, to be hot, glow). Dahood has noticed that m in MT
mlay is the comparative min with mal (than a cauldron).
For MT reqay in v. 17b LXX read my nerves (arqay), rightly apprehending that a part of the body was denoted, parallel to amay (my bones).
Actually Saadya, Ibn Ezra, Qimi and Rashi took the word as cognate with
Arab. urq (veins). This is a good description of the symptoms of fever; cf.
Mowinckel, who translates feverish pulse.
18. For MT yiapp (it is sought out or it is disguised) we read yip (it
seizes) (so LXX, Houbigant, Siegfried, Beer, Dhorme, Hlscher, Mowinckel,
Fohrer, Terrien, Pope). The subject in the 3rd person cannot be God, as
Dhorme asserts, since Job appeals to God in vv. 20ff. in the 2nd person. We
take the subject therefore as n (my afiction) in v. 16.
19. For MT hrn (it shot me) Duhm proposed the emendation hrn (it
brought me down). The colon is still short and an introductory hn may have
been omitted through haplography. Alternatively we might propose a similar assonance to ker wer in v. 19b in lemer lehomr (to mire and
confusion). This is suggested by the reference to the city of Mot the god of
death in the Ras Shamra texts as hmry (Ruin, Dissolution), cognate with the
Arab. hamratu(n) (confusion). The texts in question are Gordon UT 51
VII,12 and 67 II,15, on which see J. Gray 1965: 55 n. 56f., where we nd a
cognate of Ugaritic mhmrt with the same signicance in Ps. 140.11 (cf.
Gordon UT 67 I,7-8).
20. mat (I stand, or have taken my stand) is possibly a forensic term,
indicating that Job has come to the bar and expects God to do likewise (e.g.
Deut. 19.17; Ps. 109.6; Zech. 3.1). But it may also denote the attitude of prayer
(Jer. 15.1); cf. Solomons prayer at the dedication of the temple, standing
before the altar with his open hands stretched out (1 Kgs 8.22). For MT
wattibnen one Heb. MS and V read wel tibnen (and you do not heed)
which is read by Bickell, Siegfried, Beer, Duhm, Peters, Hlscher, Dhorme,
Mowinckel, G.E. Gray, Fohrer, Terrien. Stevenson retains MT, rendering the
verb you stare (so Pope).
21. ha in the Niphal with the adjective introduced by le in th leazkr
l (you turn cruel to me) has an excellent parallel in Isa. 63.10, wayyh
lhem ley (and he turned their enemy). MT beem ye (with the
strength of your hand) is readily intelligible, but perhaps eem-ye was
intended (lit. bone of your hand, i.e. the full strength of your hand); cf.
eem-hamayim (Exod. 24.10), beeem tumm (having quite fullled
himself, Job 21.23), etc., and the same use of Aram. gerem (lit. bone). Here,
as in Deut. 8.17, eem ye may mean all your strength. tiemn would
mean wreak your animosity against me; cf. Gen. 16.9; 27.41; 49.23; 50.15;
1
372
Job 30. Jobs Plaint
Ps. 55.4 (EVV 3). The reading has a variant reected in LXX you scourge me,
implying teen.
22. In view of the conception of God as He who Mounts the Clouds (Pss.
18.11 [EVV 10]; 68.5, 34 [EVV 4, 33]; 104.3; Deut. 33.26), like Baal in the Ras
Shamra texts (Gordon UT 51 III, 11, 18; V, 122; 67 II, 7; 68,8, 29; 76 I,7; III,
22, 37; etc.), v. 22a may have a double entendre, referring to the sufferer
caught up (tin) and made to ride the wind or raised to the status of God,
from which he is reduced to ruin. However this may be, the ruin of Job is
described in v. 22b, where he is liquidated as a cloud. The verb m is found
meaning to dissolve (Ps. 65.l1), expressing the dissolution of a solid substance; cf. Muhammads description of the fate of the wicked fusing together
in the sea of re, yamjna bau f baihim (they welter one on the top of
another).
The Qere tiyy (sound counsel, success) is quite unsuitable in this
context. The Kethib tuiwwh is a relic of the correct reading teuh (storm),
which is attested in the plural in 39.7; Isa. 22.2; Zech. 4.7 in the sense of
tumult. tesuh is a formation from the root h, from which the noun is
usually h, which means generally ruin or dissolution, but specically
storm in Ezek. 38.9 and Prov. 1.27. teuh may be the subject of temen,
or, as we prefer, the adverbial accusative, which is common in Arab.
23. Jobs return (ten) to death reects the conception that humans are from
the dust and will return to the dust (Gen. 3.19, J).
There is probably a word-play between yat (I know certainly, I am
sure) and m (certainly appointed). Alternatively b m leol-y
might be rendered the meeting place for all living (so Dhorme, Hlscher,
Mowinckel, Kissane, Fohrer, Terrien, Pope). This conception is expressed in
3.17ff., and this sense of md is supported by the compound nouns har
m (mount of assembly) and hel md (the Tent of Meeting) in the
Exodus tradition (Exod. 33.7-13; etc.). If this interpretation is accepted it
might explain the etymology of rem (the defunct) as those joined
together in the underworld, the verb r being possibly a byform of a verb
cognate with Arab. rafa(y) (to darn, join) as H.L. Ginsberg proposed (1946:
23, 41). But rem may have originally signied the dead in their inuence
over fertility (lit. healers), from the well-known Heb. verb r (to heal or
restore fertility), which we have proposed on the basis of the Ras Shamra
texts (J. Gray 1949; 1965: 120 nn. 129-31).
24. MT in v. 24a means But he did not stretch out a hand against a ruin-heap,
which makes no sense in the context, even guratively. a, which inaugurates
a train of thought contrary to what precedes, generally introduces the statement of faith against apparent alienation from God (e.g. Pss. 49.16; 62.2, 3, 5,
6, 7; 73.1), but may also introduce the protestation of innocence (e.g. Ps.
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373
73.13). The second instance illustrates the force of a in the present passage,
where it turns the train of thought from what precedes and introduces Jobs
protestation of innocence. This rules out the proposal that MT be is the
corruption of a (sinking), giving the meaning Does not a drowning
man stretch out a hand? (so Dillmann, Fohrer). But there is nothing in the text
that makes a corruption of graphically feasible, nor does la y mean to
stretch out a hand for help, but rather to give help, and in fact more often in
the OT denotes attack. Nor does it afford a parallel to v. 24b. Jobs protestation of innocent conduct introduced by a demands the reading ela for MT
yila (so LXX), giving the meaning I would stretch out (my) hand. The
connection with the sequel expressing Jobs concern for the destitute (qehym and eyn) has suggested the emendation of MT be to ben, I did not
stretch out my hand against the poor, as proposed by Wright (so Dhorme,
Kissane, Pope). Beer also reads ben as stretching out a hand to help the
poor, assuming either the omission of MT l or the interrogative sense without
the interrogative particle, which is possible. In the text as understood by
Dhorme and others the denial of aggression towards the poor would contrast
oddly with Jobs positive charity in vv. 24b-25, and we nd such a claim
singularly weak. Under these circumstances NEB comes nearer the truth with
Yet no beggar held out his hand but, though we would follow LXX in
reading ela. This follows G.R. Drivers suggestion that the original of MT
be was the participle beh, lit. asking (1936: 164f.). The verb, which
denotes a question in Isa. 21.12, also signies a request in Gen. 19.2 (cf. Syr.
be in Jn 14.16), and is found in both senses in the Aram. sections of Dan.
Cf. Arab. b?y (to ask, used in the IVth Form meaning to help to attain).
Accordingly we would read beh for MT be, assuming scribal corruption of h
to y in the Old Heb. script. We would resolve the problem of l in v. 24a by
assuming a scribal corruption of an original leay with dittography of and
corruption of the second from y in the Old Heb. script. ay in this case might
mean any; cf. Arab. ayyu(n), which is attested, though doubtfully, in Prov.
31.4. The sense, But to any who made a request I would stretch out my hand,
thus agrees with the context and particularly with the parallel colon, especially
if we follow LXX in reading a form of iwwa for MT wa. We would
further suggest that MT lhen wa is a corruption of l yeawwa (cried to
me), assuming the corruption of y to h in the Old Heb. script and y to nal n in
the stage of the development of the script in the second and rst centuries BCE.
25. am (to be grieved) is a hapax legomenon in the OT, but is well
attested in Aram. and Syr.
26. In v. 26a MT k is disregarded by LXX, S and V, and the usual causative
sense of k is inappropriate in the context. Hence we take it as the enclitic
which is found in Ugaritic introducing the nal verb, which is thus emphasized
(Gordon UT, 9.13; cf. Pss. 49.16; 118.10-11). A nal sentence may be so
1
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Job 30. Jobs Plaint
introduced with the same effect; for example, Deut. 32.9, and possibly Isa. 5.7.
The antithesis of light and well-being and darkness and calamity is very familiar in Israel, for example, Amos 5.18 and in the Qumran theology; for instance
in The War of the Sons of Light against the Sons of Darkness.
27. The verb ra, found also in 41.23 (Hiphil), is used in Ezek. 24.5, meaning to boil; cf. Ben Sira 43.3. Turmoil or fermentation may be denoted, as
here in the bowels (may) of the sufferer.
dmam may express either stillness or silence.
qiddemun (confront me) has also the temporal implication of prematurely. The Piel of the verb is used in the locative sense in 3.12 and probably
also in the Song of Deborah (Judg. 5.21), where the reference may be not to
the ancient (MT qm) River Qishon, but to the river heading off (qiddm)
the fugitives from the battle.
28. To go about black (qr hill), that is, in mourning, is a conventional
gure from the Plaint of the Sufferer (cf. Pss. 38.7; 43.2, where the verb is in
the Hithpael). The reference may be either to the black sack-cloth worn by
mourners, or to the unwashed or blackened face, which was one of the rites
indicating suspension of normal activities designed to frustrate the supernatural powers to which the primitive community considered itself particularly
vulnerable at such social crises as death.
In MT bel ammh Dahood (1966: 93) suggests that the rst word was
originally belu (scorched), citing the Ugaritic root bla. This root is indeed
attested in the Ugaritic texts, but the appreciation of the present passage as of
the literary type the Plaint of the Sufferer indicates the real signicance of
qr hillat as in the guise of a mourner as against the literalism of
Dahoods interpretation.
ammh from the root mam (to be hot) is known as sun (Isa. 24.23;
30.26; Song 6.10). On the other hand Duhm proposed the reading bel
nemh (uncomforted; so Budde, Tur-Sinai, G.B. Gray, Hlscher, Mowinckel, Fohrer), but MT is unanimously attested, either as ammh (sun, LXX,
T, Sym., S and V) or mh (wrath). We prefer the interpretation and not by
the sun as giving stronger emphasis to the signicance of qr hillat.
In v. 28b we take aawwa as the imperfect of attendant circumstances,
more common in Arab. than in Heb. The signicance of this colon as parallel
to v. 28a is that the sufferer has duly performed his mourning rites of
separation, dictated by his apparent alienation from God, and has appealed for
reinstatement in the community (haqqhl).
29. tan, not to be confused with tannn, which in certain passages denotes one
of the monsters associated with the primaeval waters of Chaos (tnn of the Ras
Shamra mythology; see on 7.12), means jackal, Arab. tnnu(n). Jobs afnity with the jackals may be his wailing, which one always associates with
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375
night-fall in Palestine; cf. Arab. wwiyt, the expressive onomatopoeic word

for jackals, but the main point of comparison is the association with the
country beyond human settlement, or the desert, as the mention of ben
yaanh in the parallel colon indicates, especially if ostriches are denoted,
which, it must be admitted, is not certain. The two are paired again in Mic.
1.8; Isa. 43.20, and the former is explicitly associated with the desert (Mal.
1.3) and with ruins (Jer. 9.10; 10.22; 49.33; 51.37; Isa. 34.13; 35.7; Ps. 44.20).
The latter is known as an unclean bird in Deut. 14.15 and Lev. 11.16, where its
association with the raven may indicate the owl rather than the ostrich. In Mic.
1.8, like the Job passage, reproducing the imagery of the Plaint of the Sufferer,
the reference is to mourning like the jackals and ben yaaneh, which again
rather indicates owls.
30. Here as in v. 17 mal (for MT mly) may mean than a cauldron,
but in view of the parallel minn-re, where min denotes the cause of the
effect, al is better taken here as a verbal noun scorching.
31. On kinnr and u see on 21.12.
Job 31
JOBS GREAT OATH OF PURGATION
Jobs negative confession, though peculiar to his Jewish milieu, has formal
afnity with the detailed ancient Near Eastern lists of delinquencies, social
and, unlike Jobs confession except 31.26f., religious and ritual. Such a
declaration, for example, marked the conclusion of the kings humiliation in
the ritual of the Babylonian New Year festival (ANET, 334) and were a part of
Assyrian fast liturgies, where the king represented the community. It is found
again in the clearance of a private individual from sin alleged to be the source
of suffering (Jastrow 1898, cited by G.B. Gray), where the subject raises the
possibility of certain sins, religious and social, which invite exculpation,
probably under oath, with the consciousness of the fearful consequences of
perjury. The enumeration of twelve offences from which Job exculpates
himself has a certain analogy in the statement of the Eloquent Peasant in Egypt
(ANET, 408-10, nine times before a noble and the tenth time before the king).
However, with the enumeration and certain particular social grievances of the
Peasant the analogy with Job 31 stops. It is not an exculpation nor is it part of
an Oath of Purgation.
Jobs negative confession, despite the analogies we have cited from the
Semitic milieu of Mesopotamia, is properly at home in Israelite tradition. Here
declared innocence of specied social evils admits one to fellowship with
worshippers in the sanctuary (Pss. 15; 24.3ff.). Again the specication of
certain social evils with an adjuration (Ps. 7.4f.) may be associated with an
individuals exculpation from false accusation, or it may precede a ritual act of
purication (Ps. 26.4-6).
While Ps. 7.4f. affords analogy to Jobs oath of purgation, the twelve
specic sins he disowns indicate the inuence of the twelve adjurations of
the covenant community in Deut. 27.15-26, though excluding the religious
offences (v. 15) and the specic sexual offences within the forbidden degrees
(vv. 20-23). A closer analogy to Jobs negative confession is in the Decalogue
(Exod. 20.3-17), though again excluding religious offences (Exod. 20.3-10),
where, however, there is no commitment under adjuration as in Deut. 27.1526. In the holiness code nearer the time when the Book of Job was written,
though characteristically religious and ritual observances are enjoined, there
are twelve social evils forbidden (Lev. 19.11-18). Thus, whether formulated
originally as apodictic law in the covenant sacrament or the crystallization of
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The Book of Job
377
instruction of local elders or heads of families, this became the norm of the
social ethic of Israel, as is reected in the prophets from Amos to Ezekiel, who
lists ve social evils (18.6b-13), all included in Jobs Oath of Purgation. The
numbers ten or twelve indicate a mnemonic expedient to impress the demands
of the code upon the popular memory in transmission of the social demands in
particular by local elders and heads of families. By the same token the
professional instructors of young aspirants to administration may well have
enumerated the virtues they commended and the vices they condemned. So
much at any rate is suggested by the thirty wise sayings of Prov. 22.17-22,
with its prototype in the thirty sayings of the Egyptian scribe Amenemope
c. 1000 BCE (ANET, 421-25).
Thus in presenting Jobs Oath of Purgation the author draws on a wellestablished tradition in Israel which informed daily life in the community in
the law, the cult and in the instruction of the sages. In the element of adjuration, however, it is the forensic and the religious tradition which is reected.
The chapter falls into two parts, Jobs great oath of purgation (vv. 1-34
including vv. 38-40b) and his challenge to God to state and subscribe his
indictment in order that there might be a concrete charge to answer in Jobs
defence of his innocence (vv. 35-37).
The rst part consists of ten strophes (vv. 1-4, 5-8, 9-12, 13-15, 38-40b, 1617+ 19 + 20 + 18 + 21-22, 24-28, 29-32, 33-34 + 23).
The rst strophe is formally distinct from Jobs oath of purgation in that it is
not introduced by the protasis and concluded by the imprecation. Nor is it the
disavowal of a concrete sin. It is a direct statement that Job had made a
covenant with his eyes not to look upon a virgin. kra ber, well known in
Heb. as the technical phrase for making a covenant, has a different signicance here from what was usual in Israel. It is rather to be understood in the
light of a vassal-treaty, such as those imposed by the Hittite kings upon their
North Syrian vassals, including the king of Ugarit (Nougayrol 1956: 40-44).
Here the suzerain secures his own interests, while rmly imposing control of
the actions of his vassals, as in the covenant in Israel. Thus at the outset of his
oath of purgation Job asserts that he has achieved complete self-control, the
aim of the wise man. His eyes as the object of his control, and sexual lust,
which at rst sight seems tautological in view of the denial of adultery (v. 9)
may be explained as synecdoche, signifying complete control of the senses.
The statement prepares us for the suppression of the evil inclination implied in
the denial of the actual sin, which is a feature of the chapter. Here Heb.
Wisdom anticipates Jesus radical teaching in the Sermon on the Mount (Mt.
5.21f., 28).
Thereafter the passage follows the literary form of the oath of purgation, as
in Psalm 7. Innocence of particular sins is declared in a hypothesis positive or
negative with the imprecation as apodosis, either expressed or understood (e.g.
vv. 7-8, 9-12, 21-22, 38-40b, 33-34, 23). In such cases as a formal protasis is
not followed by an imprecation in the apodosis, as in vv. 16, 17, 19, 20, 18,
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Job 31. Jobs Great Oath of Purgation
24-28 and 29-32, the formal protasis of the incomplete conditional sentence
is tantamount in Hebrew idiom to an emphatic assertion either positive or
negative. It is signicant, in connection with the twelve adjurations with which
Israel endorsed the denitive obligations of the covenant, that Job in his oath
of purgation declares his innocence of twelve sins, for example, lust or lack of
self-control (vv. 1-4), deceit (vv. 5-6), covetousness (vv. 7-8), adultery (vv. 912), evasion of legal obligation to his slaves or tenants (vv. 13-15, 39a),
neglect of charitable obligations (vv. 16-21), materialism (vv. 24-25), atavistic
reverence for astral bodies (vv. 26-28), malicious gloating over an enemys
misfortune (vv. 29-30), inhospitality (vv. 31-32), fear of public opinion,
occasioning either hypocrisy or failure to declare himself in a just but
unpopular cause (vv. 33-34) and land-grabbing (vv. 38, 39b).
The second part of the chapter, the single strophe in vv. 35-37, is wholly in
the legal convention, the citation of the accuser.
The arrangement of the text is in some doubt among scholars. The proper
end of Jobs oath of purgation and its grand climax in his appeal to the tribunal
of God is at v. 37. The declarations of innocence and the adjurations in vv. 3840b belong in form and content to vv. 5-34, 23. This is generally agreed, but
there is no agreement as to where the passage actually belongs. G.B. Gray and
Fohrer locate it after v. 24; Dhorme, Kissane and Mowinckel after 32; Hlscher
and Pope after v. 8; and Stevenson after v. 20. We suggest that the reference to
the treatment of peasant tenants indicates a grouping with the other dependants, slaves of both sexes in vv. 13-14, which leads to the nal oath in v. 40ab.
The nal statement that the words of Job are ended (v. 40c) is editorial. The
position of v. 23 is also doubtful, though G.B. Gray, Kissane, Fohrer and
Terrien retain MT. Hlscher omits it, evidently as a gloss, though he goes on to
state that, however it may be interpreted, it does not fall after v. 22. The last
proposition is generally admitted, but is variously explained. Stevenson,
admitting its association with v. 24, suggests that the verse is displaced from
after 24ff., while Dhorme treats it as the heading to vv. 24ff. Pope reads it
after v. 14 and Mowinckel after v. 27. In vv. 24-34 Jobs various disavowals
lack the adjuration or the equivalent. In this case, of course, we may still take
his statements introduced by im or im l as emphatic denials or asseverations in which the adjuration is simply understood. But we should expect
either an adjuration or at least a statement that Job has laid himself under
divine sanctions. Thus we regard v. 23 as displaced from after v. 34, where
Jobs assertion that he feared God comes naturally after his reference to fear of
public opinion.
Verse 18, if the text is correct, is pointless in its position in MT, and is
probably displaced from after v. 20, where it may be read naturally as the
blessing of the destitute on his benefactor.
We assume a lacuna before v. 35c, which, however, may be no more than
the rst colon of a bicolon ending in v. 35c.
1
The Book of Job
Chapter 31
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
38.
39.
40a.
b.
16.
17.
19.
20.
1
I had made a covenant with my eves

Not to look1 upon a virgin.
What then is the portion (allotted by) God above,
What requital from the Almighty from on high?
Is not disaster (the portion) of the wicked,
And calamity for the workers of iniquity?
Does he not mark my way,
And number all my steps?
If I have walked with falsehood,
Or my foot hastened to deceit,
Then may (God) weigh me with just balance,
And let him know my innocence.
If my steps ever swerve from the way,
And my heart stray after my eyes,
Or anything2 stick to my hands,
Then may I sow and another eat,
And my produce be uprooted!
If my heart has been seduced by a woman,
And I have lurked at my neighbours door,
May my own wife grind to another,
And may others lie upon her.
That3 were indeed a wanton crime,
A criminal wrong!
4A re that consumes even to Perdition,
Which would scorch up5 all my crops.
Never did I spurn the case of my slave,
Or of my maidservant if they had a suit against me
For what should I do if God rose up against me,
And if he held enquiry what should I answer him?
Did not he who made me in the womb make him,
Did not the same One fashion us6 both in the womb?
If the land I occupied cried out because of me,
Its furrows all weeping with it,
If I consumed its strength without cost,
Drove its workers7 to exhaustion,
Instead of wheat may thorns come forth,
And instead of barley noxious weeds!
I never restrained the poor from what he wanted,
Nor disappointed the widow,
Nor ate my morsel alone,
And the fatherless ate not of it.
Never did I see one perishing for want of clothing,
The poor man without a covering.
Surely mens loins8 blessed me
When they were warmed by the eece of my lambs,
379
380
18.
(Saying) Surely from my youth he brought me up9 like a father,

And from my mothers womb he guided me.10
21.
If ever I shook my st against the innocent11

Because I saw my bullies in the gate,
May my shoulder-blade fall from its socket12
And my arm be broken off from its joint.13
22.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
23,
35.
36.
37.
40c.
If I made gold my condence,

And called ne gold my trust,
If ever I was elated with my abundant wealth
Because my own power had got much,
If ever I marked the sun when it was bright
Or the moon in its cool course,14
My heart being secretly seduced,15
My hand throwing a kiss from my mouth,
He himself would mark my tricks,16
For I should have been false to God above.
I never rejoiced at my enemys calamity,
Nor was glad17 when evil befell him,
Nor suffered my mouth to sin,
Demanding his life in a curse.
The inmates of my tent will declare,
Who could adduce one who has not been lled with his meat?
The stranger never had to pass the night in the street,
I opened my door to the wayfarer.18
I never covered up my sins from others,19
Hiding my iniquity in my bosom,
Because I feared the rumour of the capital,
And because the contempt of the families scared me,
So that I kept silence and refrained from coming out of doors,
For the terror of God overwhelms20
And before his majesty I am powerless!
O that one might give me a hearing!
Behold, this is my ardent desire;21 let the Almighty answer me!
(Would that I had) the indictment written by my adversary!
I would certainly shoulder the liability,
I would bind it on me like a turban.22
I would account to him for my every step,
As a notable should I would present it.
The end of Jobs statement.

1.
2.
3.
1
Reading mhibnn for MT mh etbnn.

Reading memh for MT mem.
Reading h (Qere) for MT h (Kethib).
The Book of Job

4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
381
Omitting k, metri causa.

Reading tera for MT ter. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading wayenenn for MT wayeunenn.
Conjecturing palh for MT belh.
Conjecturing alm for MT al.
Reading giddelan for MT gelan.
Reading anenn for MT anennh, assuming corruption of y to h in the Old Heb.
script.
Conjecturing al m for MT al-ym.
Reading imh, with 3rd fem. sing. pronom. sufx.
Reading miqqnh (with 3rd fem. sing. pronom. sufx).
Reading yqar (Hiphil of qrar) for MT yqr. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading wayyipp for MT wayyit.
Reading gam-h yn nitely or pely (pausal forms) for MT gam-h wn
pell. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading wehirat with T for MT wehirart.
Reading lra with LXX, Aq., S, T and V for MT lra.
Reading mm for MT kem, m being corrupted to k in the Old Heb. script.
Reading k paa l yd ly for MT k paa lay l (v. 23). See
Commentary ad loc.
Reading taaw for MT tw.
Reading aere for MT ar.
1. On kra beri in this context see introduction to ch. 31. In MT mh
ebnn, mh might introduce a rhetorical question, though this would be
abrupt with no syntactical connection with the context. The text may be a
corruption of im ebnn, in the protasis of a conditional sentence with
aposeopesis of the imprecation to express a strong denial, which would be in
order after the mention of the covenant, implying oath, in v. 1a. Alternatively
the original may have been mhibnn (not to consider), as suggested by V,
which, however, does not exclude the rst suggestion. The reference to belh
(a virgin) stands in peculiar isolation in the chapter, and might be doubted in
view of the denial of adultery in v. 9. Hence Duhm conjectured halh (folly
or mockery); cf. Peakes conjecture nelh (senselessness), so Pope,
which is much further from MT. But MT, which is attested in the ancient versions, recalls a similar phrase in Ben Sira 9.5ff. See further the Introduction to
ch. 31.
3. ner is found in Classical Heb. only here and in the form ner in Obad.
12, where it means afiction. It has the same nuance as Ass. nakru and
Arab. nakura (to be harsh, hateful).
4. Way, steps, walking (with falsehood); cf. 5, for conduct is
characteristic of sapiential idiom.
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382
5. Here again walking with falsehood (w), the foot hastening to deceit
(mirmh), steps swerving from the way and the heart straying after the eyes
is in the sapiential idiom. In the propensity to deceit (v. 5) and covetousness
leading to determination to acquire (the heart straying after the eyes, v. 7b)
Job recognizes the evil inclination as the prelude to the overt act of forcible
appropriation (or anything stick to my hands, v. 7c); cf. ma in the
Decalogue (Exod. 20.17; Deut. 5.18). It has been suggested that, with LXX, S
and two Heb. MSS, we should read im-me w for MT im-w in v. 5,
with men of vanity (so Bickell, Grimme) or im-anee w (so Ley), which
is a more likely original, but the parallelism with the abstract mirmh
(deceit) supports MT.
5-6. The form watta seems to come from h, probably a byform of the
regular u. The weighing visualized by Job may reect the Egyptian conception of the weighing of the soul of the dead against the feather of Maat
(truth, order) and the recording of his account by Thoth, the ibis god; cf.
the famous judgment scene in the book of the Dead (ANEP, pl. 639). Though
there may be here the nuance of righteousness in eeq, the phrase mzeneeq denotes primarily right balances, that is, properly adjusted.
7. After his condent protestation of innocence Job continues with his famous
oath of purgation with its solemn adjurations. From this point onwards im is
the conditional particle in the oath formula. The adjuration Let me sow and
another eat (v. 8a) indicates that v. 7 visualizes the breach of the tenth commandment, l tam, both in its primary sense Thou shalt not appropriate
rapaciously and, as apparently taken from the Deuteronomic form of the
Decalogue, Thou shalt not covet. In v. 7c MT eapp aq mem the last
word may be either a masc. form of the noun or scriptio defectiva for memh
(so Weiser) or simply a scribal error for memh; cf. Deut. 13.18 (EVV 17),
wel-yibaq beyae memh. V evidently read mm (spot, blemish), so
also T, but alongside the reading memh. In view of the passage in Deut.
13.18, memh or MT mem as a masc. variant may be read, but in view of
the close verbal correspondence with this passage it may be an editorial
expansion in Job (so Hlscher, Fohrer).
8. The intensive r (here Pual to be uprooted) has both positive and privative senses, meaning both to root (e.g. Isa. 40.24; Jer. 12.2) and to uproot
(e.g. Ps. 52.7; cf. Arab. jaladda [to bind (a book) or to skin (a beast)]).
The adjuration Let me sow and another reap is reminiscent of the elaboration of the curse after the Twelve Adjurations in Deut. 27.15-26 in the
Covenant-sacrament (Deut. 28.15ff., particularly Deut. 28.30, 33. This is the
general context against which the social ethic implied in Jobs oath of purgation is to be set.
There may be a double entendre in eeay, which signies both vegetable
produce and offspring.
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9-12. Verses 9-10, with vv. 11-12 probably a sapiential expansion, concern the
breach of the commandment against adultery, and may have been introduced
by v. 1 in MT. ih undened implies a wife, as the parallel colon indicates,
with its vivid image of the adulterer lurking at his neighbours door to see him
leave the house.
9. l has here the sense of reason or understanding, as generally in Heb.
pah (to be simple, to be seduced) is the regular word for the seduction of
either sex (e.g. Exod. 22.16; Judg. 14.15; 16.5; Hos. 2.16 [Piel]), or in the
general sense; cf. v. 27; Prov. 1.10; 16.29; etc.
Lurking, lit. lying in ambush (ra), at the door of ones neighbour is the
tactic of the adulterer, as the context indicates.
After the disavowal of the crime the adjuration recalls the curse in Deut.
28.30. We cannot attest a sexual sense for an which would t the context,
as has been assumed by V and T here and in Lam. 5.13b (cf. Jerome in his
commentary on Judg. 16.21), though this would be intelligible if the verb were
passive; cf. Tur-Sinai, who reads the Niphal tihn for MT tian. Grinding
denotes a menial task of the lowest class of female (cf. Exod. 11.5; Isa. 47.2)
and was the rst operation of the day while it was yet dark. The depth of the
womans degradation, or rather that of her husband, is indicated by the plural,
arn, of those who would lie with her. As adultery was regarded as an
infringement of a mans honour, and indeed property, without regard to the
humiliation or delinquency of the woman as such, so his wife is merely
instrumental in the punishment of the adulterer as one of his goods and
chattels quite apart from her own rights as an individual. The plural ending of
arn, if MT is correct and not simply a scribal error of n for m in the Old
Heb. script, is one of the many Aramaisms in the Book of Job.
11. This may be the rst gloss on vv. 9-10.
zimmh, cognate with Arab. damma (to be foul) or amma (to blame), is
used in the OT for various wanton acts such as murder (Hos. 6.9; Prov. 10.23;
21.27), but particularly of sexual wantonness (e.g. Lev. 18.17; 20.14; Jer.
13.27; Ezek. 23.21, 27, 29, 35).
MT wn pellm (cf. Exod. 21.22) would seem to mean a wrong for
arbitration, that is, to be punished by the judges, or as we should say a
criminal offence. The note is repeated in v. 28a, where MT reads pell as an
adjective, which should probably be read also in v. 11b. V and T read the
phrase respectively as a very great iniquity and an extraordinary sin,
suggesting the reading pele for MT pell(m), which is orthographically
feasible. pele and its associate forms denotes something which implies the
initiative and the immediate activity of God without the evidence of secondary
causes. On this reading, the text, if original, might mean a sin which provoked
Gods immediate retribution. D.R. Ap-Thomas (1956: 253) proposed that
wn pell means a wrong that excludes a man from the community, which
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might claim the support of Arab. falla (to escape, be routed). But the verse
may be a gloss suggested by the corruption of yn niteltay in v. 28a, on
which see.
12. This verse, possibly a sapiential expansion, cites a popular proverb (cf.
Prov. 6.27-29). k may indicate the gloss, or it may be an inadvertent repetition
of k in v. 11 or a dittograph of k after nal m of the preceding word and of y
before of the following word in the Old Heb. script. But it may be a scribal
error for the comparative preposition ke.
ad-aaddn, which we have taken as even to Perdition, may mean for
ever; cf. Arab. abadan with a negative never and abad (perpetual).
ter is not appropriate for re, hence the reading tir is proposed
(Wright, Duhm) and is generally accepted. The corruption of p to , however,
is unlikely at any stage of the development of the script. More feasible
graphically in the Old Heb. script would be ter (parched); cf. Isa. 49.10,
wel-yakkm r wme (And there shall not strike them scorching nor
sun), and r in modern Hebrew for the sirocco. This would accord with
te in the sense of crops. G.R. Drivers suggestion (1955: 88f.), however,
is much more likely, that ter is a corruption by metathesis of tera, a
cognate of Akk. rau (to be red-hot).
13-15. Job clears himself of the charge of injustice to his slaves, whose legal
rights (rm in v. 13b), though less than those of a freeman, were nevertheless admitted in the Book of the Covenant (Exod. 21.1-11). In this case the
adjuration is omitted, hence as in the truncated form of the oath in asseveration
or denial we must translate Never did I spurn, understanding the adjuration. Instead of the adjuration there is an interesting statement of the equality
of persons in v. 15. In v. 14 it is implied that as the master had sovereign rights
over the slave in the community, the slave has no vindicator but God, and to
no other, and no less, is the master responsible.
14. pqa means to review or take stock of, here to call to account and so
to note deciency; cf. niqa (to be lacking) and Arab. faqada (to lose).
The Hiphil of (to return) with or without the object dr (word)
means regularly to answer, and takes the direct object, since it is tantamount
to a transitive verb.
15. eha does not qualify reem (womb) as LXX, Sym., S, T and Jerome in
his commentary assume but, as V indicates, it is the subject of the verb in MT,
which might better be read wayyenenn. This is the interpretation of most
commentators except Delitzsch, Ehrlich and Stevenson. Hlscher takes it as a
gloss.
38-40b. On the position of this passage after v. 15 suggested by the common
theme of oppression of subordinates, see the Introduction to ch. 31. Job
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declares that the land he occupies (aem) is not acquired as Ahab had
acquired Naboths vineyard; there is consequently no entail of tears (cf. the
blood of Abel crying out from the ground, Gen. 4.10) with the consequence
of infertility (cf. v. 40ab). The conception of the land crying out for vengeance
and refusing to yield because of blood shed violently on it is connected with
the conception of the close connection between a man and his land; cf. the
establishment of a dead mans name on his hand (Ruth 4.5).
38. Consuming the strength of the land without cost (bel ese) and the sequel
seems indicate exploiting the land and its workers (palh for MT belh)
through over-cropping in the precarious situation, where natural fertility was
restored only by the release of the chemicals of the earth through rain and the
heat of the sun or through the meagre dung of the working animals. In the
circumstances a fallow year was necessary (Deut. 15.1ff.). Duhm in fact
explains the passage as the failure to observe the year of release.
39. ka, generally strength, means here produce as in Joel 2.22, where it is
parallel to per (fruit). MT belh (its masters), which Mowinckel takes to
mean spirits of the eld, could mean the owners of the land, the victims of
ruthless exploitation, like Naboth (1 Kgs 21). Pope thinks of share-farmers,
and Larcher of workers (palm), which we prefer (so too Dahood). hippt
means literally I caused to breathe out (cf. mappa ne in 11.20), hence
drove to exhaustion rather than caused the death of (RSV).
40. The curse of weeds recalls the curse on the land after the fall (Gen. 3.1718). a is well attested in the OT as thorns, but bh is a hapax legomenon; cf. beum, weeds or inferior grapes in Isaiahs Song of the Vineyard
(Isa. 5.2, 4). We might cite Arab. bi as a term of opprobrium (harm) and
hazard the translation noxious weeds.
16-20, 18. In Jobs statement of his philanthropy there is no adjuration explicitly expressed, hence the formula im must be translated as an emphatic
denial.
16. This may refer to the withholding of justice from the poor or to grudging
their relief or charity (cf. Deut. 15.7-8) or to deferring their daily wages (Deut.
24.14). The widow (almnh) and the orphan (ym) (v. 17) were peculiarly
the responsibility of the leaders of the community (see above on 29.12-13).
The failing (klh) of the eyes describes disappointed expectation; cf. Deut.
28.32.
The eating of a piece (of bread) alone is a striking expression of antisocial
conduct, of particular point in the ancient East and in a particularist community such as the village or tribal kinship.
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18. This verse is lacking from LXX before Origens recension, and is obscure
and pointless in its context in MT. It is treated as a gloss (Hlscher, Fohrer) on
MT gelan emended to aaddelenn (I reared him), which, after the nal y
in the preceding word is graphically feasible in the Old Heb. script. In this
case anennh (I led her) would refer to the widow in v. 16b (so Dhorme,
Pope). On this we may remark that Jobs guidance of the widow from the
womb, that is, all her life, is rather strange. If the verse must be retained in its
present position in MT a more feasible suggestion might be to emend MT
anennh to anaemennah (I would comfort her) with haplography of m
before n in the Old Heb. script, but even so the difculty of the conception of
Job assuming this responsibility from the womb remains. It seems more
natural to take from the womb to refer to the beneciary, hence we propose
to read anenn, assuming the corruption of y to h in the Hebraic script. We
read giddelan for MT gelan, and transpose the verse to after v. 20, where it
is the blessing of the destitute mentioned in vv. 19-20.
20. gz is little attested in the OT, only in fact in Amos 7.1 and Ps. 72.6, where
it is used of mowing, and in Deut.18.4, where, like the verb gzaz in 2 Sam.
13.23, it signies sheep-rearing as here.
21-22. This strophe, in the regular form of the oath of purgation, reects the
misuse of power by the inuential who corrupted judgment by personal
menace (v. 21a) or intimidation through the presence of strong-arm men (v.
21b). After the case of the orphan has been dealt with in 17 it is unlikely that
he should be again mentioned in isolation in v. 21. Hence with Duhm, Budde,
G.B. Grey, Peters, Hlscher, Stevenson, Mowinckel and Fohrer we read al
tm (against the innocent) for MT al-ym, which Dhorme, Pope and
Terrien retain. The verb n means to wave, here the hand, in menace, shaking the st (Ball), as in Isa. 10.32; 11.15; 19.16; Zech. 2.13. ezr, generally
taken as my help, that is, support, may be a collective singular of a cognate
of Ugaritic ?zr (young henchman); cf. Gordon, UH nt II,22, and in the OT
Ezek. 12.14 and Ps. 89.20:
iww zr (for MT zer) al-gibbr
harm br mm (possibly mm)
I have set a youth above a mighty man,
I have raised a young man above the people (possibly the mighty).
(See Albright 1949: 233, and, for other instances in the OT, with Ugaritic
references, J. Gray 1965: 263f.) Analogies for the fem. collective sing. are
reh (travellers) and glh (exiles), and in the Ras Shamra texts tdt
(witnesses) and rt (enemies) (Gordon UT 137,22 and 68.9).
22. qneh means the beam of a balance in Isa. 46.6. A hapax legomenon here
as part of the body, the word is attested in the description of mourning rites in
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the Baal myth of Ras Shamra; cf. Gordon UH 62.4; 67.VI, 20: qn zrh yr (he
scores the humeral joint of his arm).
23. See below after v. 34.
44. The Psalms and sapiential literature of the OT are full of animadversions
on those who place their condence (kesel, mit) in material wealth rather
than God (e.g. Pss. 49.7-8 [EVV 6-7]; 52.9 [EVV 7] etc.; cf. Job 22.25). The
strophe vv. 24-28, introduced by the protasis of a conditional sentence as in
the oath of purgation, lacks the nal imprecation, having instead the assertion
of Gods notice of the faults. As in vv. 5-8 two delinquencies are denied,
materialism and superstition, both possibly indicating misplaced trust.
25. kabbr is familiar in Job in the sense of big, as in Arab. (e.g. 8.2, numerous, that is, in age; cf. 15.10); cf. kabbr ymm in 34.7, which is also familiar
in Arab., and mighty in power or status (e.g. 34.24; 36.5), as in Phoenician,
to judge from the Greek transliteration kabiroi describing the great gods. It is
more familiar in Aram. The parallelism of kabbr and r here recurs in
Isa.16.14.
14. The incidence of kabbr in Job indicates a late usage and possibly Aram.
inuence, though Isa. 16.14 indicates that the word in this sense was already
known in Classical Heb. m, as well as meaning to nd, means to light
upon or acquire; cf. Prov. 18.22, m ih m wayyeq rn
myhwh (He who gets a wife gets a good thing and acquires favour from
Yahweh).
26. The astral cults were practised throughout the Near East and had been
promoted in Israel, particularly under Assyrian domination during the reign of
Manasseh (685641 BCE), a situation reected in Deut. 4.19; 2 Kgs 23.5; Jer.
8.1-2; Zeph. 1.5. The reference in Job is rather to long-established popular
respect for the sun and moon, on the regular inuence of which on the seasons
the local peasant depended. Such local superstition is well attested by the
gurines of the fertility-goddesses Astarte and Asherah in various archaeological sites in Syria and Palestine. r, generally light in Classical Heb., is
rendered sun in LXX, which is undoubtedly the meaning here. The sun was
one of the deities, actually a goddess, in the pantheon of Canaan known from
the Ras Shamra texts, among which there is a hymn to the sun (Gordon UT
62,42-52). There are specic allusions to the recrudescence of sun-worship at
the end of the Davidic monarchy in 2 Kgs 23.5, 11, and in the exile (Ezek.
8.16). The worship of the moon is attested at Ugarit in texts referring to ritual
at given phases of the moon and particularly in a text celebrating the marriage
of the moon-god (yr) and the moon-goddess (nkl), the centre of whose cult in
antiquity was at Harran in northern Mesopotamia. In MT yqr hl the
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pointing of yqr indicates an adjective (honourable) or the adverbial

accusative, as the attachment to hl may indicate, (stately). Even so, this is
not an apt parallel to the brightness of the sun in v. 26a, which V and T obviously expected in rendering bright. Balls emendation of MT yqr to yrq
is suggested by LXX the waning moon, yrq being possibly from the root
rqaq (to be thin). This hardly denotes an essential attribute of the moon
comparable to the brightness of the sun. The parallelism is surely between the
essential characteristics of each. Hence we propose that MT yqr be pointed
yqar, the Hiphil of qrar (to be cool), the coolness of the moon being
complementary to the brightness of the sun, and a welcome relief from its
heat.
27. MT wavyit libb might be better read wayyippalibb; cf. v. 9a. In the
phrase wattiaq y le the rst word means kiss as it usually does in
Classical Heb., but we should expect rather my mouth kisses my hand. But if
we take the verb as the Niphal in the passive sense, the meaning in normal
Heb. idiom would be my hand is kissed by my mouth, as in throwing a
kiss, doubtless a reference to a well-known superstitious rite.
28. Hlscher discards this verse from the original Book of Job as a gloss, but
Stevenson seems nearer the truth in suggesting that it is the source of the gloss
in v. 11 (see above ad loc.). The difcult text is possibly to be reconstructed
from S, which reads he also sees all my misdeeds (gam-h yn [kol-]
ally) or, better, we suggest, nitely (my tricks).
29-32. This is another case where sin is denied without the formal adjuration.
So the introductory im signies strong denial. As in vv. 5-8 and vv. 24-28 two
sins are denied, vindictiveness (vv. 29f.) and inhospitality (vv. 31f.), which is
stated positively. Job does not take pleasure in even his enemys calamity
(p), thereby observing the principle laid down in the Book of the Covenant
that one must not let enmity hinder one from doing a good turn to ones
neighbour (Exod. 23.4-5). Proverbs 24.17 is much nearer the present passage
with its injunction, Do not rejoice when your enemy falls, and let not your
heart be glad when he stumbles. The intensive of the verb n denotes
habitual and intensive hatred, and perhaps malice in encouraging others to
hate. MT wehirart would mean and I got excited, which has only the
dubious analogy of 17.8. The parallel ema suggests that wehirat
(shouted for joy) should be read (cf. Pss. 60.10; 65.14); cf. terh (shout of
joy). This is supported by T and also probably by LXX, S and V (so Tur-Sinai,
G.B. Gray, Stevenson and most modern commentators).
30. The phrase al nee (to ask for the life of) is actually used in 1 Kgs
5.11, where Solomon is commended for not asking for the life of his enemy in
the famous theophany at Gibeon. Hlscher quotes also Ezek. 13.17-23, where
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black magic towards this sinister end is condemned. Jobs commendable

restraint contrasts with the curse of the impassioned sufferer in the Plaint (Pss.
58.7-10 [EVV 6-9]; 59.12-14 [EVV 11-13]), an indication of the restraint of
passion that wisdom teachers encouraged, indicative also of their independence of the cult.
31. Like an Arab sheikh Job fulls the ideal of generosity (Arab. karmu[n]).
The men of my tent (me ohol) may signify the people of the guest-tent
but, in view of the mention of the stranger and the wayfarer in v. 32, it
probably refers to the habitus of Jobs tent, that is, his own people; cf. Arab.
ah1u(n). The allusion to homosexuality which Tur-Sinai and Pope have
claimed is surely gratuitous in Jobs oath of purgation, though philologically
possible. My meat contrasts with the piece of bread, the day to day diet of
the poor. The guest is honoured with a special meal; cf. Abrahams entertainment of his guests at Mamre (Gen. 18.7f.), the fatted calf for the Prodigal Son,
and the unique horse slaughtered by the Arab for a guest. m-yittn does not, as
it usually does, introduce a wish, but here a rhetorical question, Who could
adduce?
32. Jobs hospitality to the stranger in the settlement is exactly paralleled by
Lots at Sodom (Gen. 19.1-3) or that of the old man of Gibeah to the Levite
and his concubine from Bethlehem (Judg. 19.16-21) and may be suggested by
those passages. It is difcult to determine the specic signicance of gr here.
In sedentary communities in Israel it would denote a resident alien, not necessarily a refugee from justice seeking asylum in an alien community, whose
rights depended upon men of status such as Job. In the border lands, however,
gr might be like jru llhi, the refugee from the avenger of blood to whom
the right or sanctuary has been granted. But the parallelism with ra (wayfarer) may indicate the chance sojourner rather than the refugee.
33-34, 23. The nal strophe in Jobs oath of purgation conforms to the regular
pattern provided that v. 23 with the imprecation is transposed from after v. 22,
where it is superuous.
33. Hypocrisy or dissemblance (kissh) of sins is noted as a heinous offence in
Ps. 32.5 and Prov. 28.13. kem is taken by T as like Adam, who sought to
hide his sin from God (Gen. 3.8, so Strahan, Tur-Sinai, Gordis, Pope, Terrien).
Dhorme cites van Hoonacker with approval for the interpretation like any
man (cf. Hos. 6.7; Ps. 82.7; so also Kissane, Weiser). The passage in Hosea
however, is doubtful metrically, and a gloss like Adam is to be suspected,
while Ps. 82.7 refers to general mortality. Graetzs reading, mm (from
humans), may be preferred (so Budde, Ball, Hlscher, Stevenson, Mowinckel,
Fohrer), m having been corrupted to k in the Old Heb. script. In v. 33b ubb,
which Fohrer takes as fold in the breast of a cloak, is probably Aram.
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Logically this implies that Job had some sin to hide, which would not accord
with his oath of purgation. Fohrer proposes to get over this difculty by
assuming that Job asserted that he would not have played the hypocrite if he
had sinned.
34. For the comparatively rare use of ra (to fear) in Classical Heb., cf.
Deut. 1.29; 7.21; 20.3; 31.6; Josh. 1.9. The difculty of the juxtaposition of
masc. hmn and fem. rabbh is probably to be solved by pointing the former
noun as a construct before the absolute rabbh in the sense of the capital (so
Dhorme, citing Chajes); cf. rabba ammn. Verse 34c is probably a secondary
expansion (so Volz, Jastrow, Hlscher, Mowinckel, Fohrer).
23. In MT k paa l y l, which LXX paraphrases for the fear of the
Lord constrains me, we regard d as cognate of Arab. da, yad (to be
strong), aydu (n) (power, authority), rendering For the fear of God
overwhelms me.
35-37. The second part of ch. 31, in forensic idiom, concludes with Jobs nal
appeal for a hearing with the charges openly stated by his divine adversary,
which, condent in his innocence asserted in his oath of purgation, he should
appropriate together with the imprecation in his oath.
35. In MT m yittn-l, the l is probably a dittograph of the second l at the end
of the colon. E.F. Sutcliffes proposal to take it as the remnant of an original
m yittn l yima (so too Ball, G.B. Gray) would overload v. 35a and detract
from the effect of the suspended mention of the Almighty in v. 35b. tw is
generally taken as my sign, that is, the cross, the last letter of the alphabet in
the Old Heb. script, the signature of an illiterate (so Mowinckel, Richter,
Rowley, Fohrer). Stevenson suggested that the mark was a cult-sign tattooed
on the hand or arm of Job as a worshipper of Yahweh, to whom he now
appeals for vindication. This is no less a conjecture than the interpretation of
the cross as a signature, which, at the end of Jobs statement has more point.
Larcher in JB, on the other hand, emphasizes taw as the last letter of the
alphabet and renders I have had my say, from A to Z. V and T, however,
suggest that tw means my desire, indicating a reading taw from the verb
wh (so G.R. Driver 1936: 166; Sutcliffe 1949: 71f.; Saydon 1961: 252).
This would accord with m yittn (Would that I had) in v. 35a.
We prefer to regard v. 36c as the second colon of a couplet where the rst
colon containing the verb was dropped out (so DriverGray, Hlscher,
Mowinckel, Fohrer).
The gure is that of a bill of indictment drawn up by an opponent at law (
r). For ser as the technical term for such a document, cf. the deed of
divorce in Deut. 24.1, 3 and Isa. 50.1, and of conveyance in Jer. 32.11f., 14,
16. Job desires to have the charge specied, condent that he can refute it.
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36. I would take it upon my shoulder may refer to a rite whereby liability
was imputed and admitted, as the key of the house of David upon the shoulder
of the royal chamberlain Eliakim (Isa. 22.22; cf. 9.5). The binding of the
charge about the head like a turban may have had a like signicance, symbolizing the appropriation of the curse involved in the charge if it could be
sustained (so Fohrer). There may also be a reference to the keeping of legal
documents in the turban, as the Scottish barons in the Isle of Arran kept their
title deeds given by King Robert the Bruce in their bonnets. There is of course
in arh (crown) the implication of dignity, not necessarily royal dignity, as
in Prov. 4.9; 12.4; 14.24; 16.31; 17.6; Ben Sira 1.18; 25.6, though Jobs appeal
does reect the tradition of the ordeal of the king as representative of his
people.
37. mispar eay, lit. the number of my steps, emphasizes the number,
that is, my every step.
There is a word-play between agg (I will declare) and n, which is
generally taken in this passage to denote a leader accustomed to authority
and responsibility and not a suppliant. This is probably the sense, but n
may have the sense of directly or without evasion; cf. ned (straight in
front of him, Josh. 6.5; Amos 4.3; Jer. 31.39; Neh. 12.37). Throughout this
nal appeal Job has assumed the role of a leader in the community, to which,
like an Arab sheikh or ancient king, he has responsibilities and of which he is
the representative; cf. ch. 29, especially v. 25. A. Caquot (1960) has well
emphasized the role of the king, especially in the fast-liturgy, as the prototype
of the sufferer in this section especially of Job. We consider it probable that
many psalms of the type of the Plaint of the Sufferer, which are a Hebrew
prototype of the Book of Job in general and of individual passages in the
Book, were originally from fast-liturgies in which the king represented the
community in rites of penance. Lvque (1970: 492) would see in Job kem
n (as a leader) his conscious role as representative of all worthy
sufferers.
Job 3237
INTERPOLATION
Chapters 3237 of the book of Job are generally regarded as a later insertion.
This is supported by the fact that Elihu is not named among Jobs friends in
the Prologue (2.11) or the Epilogue (42.7-9), where those are specifically
named, and by the fact that the statements of Job in the Dialogue are cited and
systematically countered in these speeches. The section, extending unbroken
over six chapters, is a lecture rather than part of the dialectic argument
between Job and his friends. It disrupts the literary structure of the book and
barbarously impairs the dramatic effect of Gods reply to Job (38.140.14)
both by its insertion after Jobs passionate appeal in his oath of purgation and
by anticipating the substance of Gods reply that the ultimate explanation and
purpose of creation and human experience lies with God transcendent (chs.
3537). Thus in the context of the debate in Job it makes no fresh contribution
except to insist on the aspect of suffering such as Jobs as a positive discipline
under divine control (33.15-18) and that there are supernatural forces commending humans to Gods mercy (35.19-20). The Elihu section is therefore
best explained as the contribution of a later sage who feels uneasy at the
possible effects of Jobs trenchant criticism of the theodicy as expressed by the
three friends and by their inability effectively to contradict him. But for all his
embarrassment the sage can only support orthodox dogma by emphasizing
what has been already stated.
By the criterion of his respective addresses to Job and his three friends the
matter may be arranged after the prose introduction (32.1-5) and by his introductory statement to the four (32.6-22) thus: 33 (to Job); 34 (to the friends);
35.136.26 (to Job); 36.2737.13 (a Hymn of Praise to the Creator, suggested
by Elihus statement on Gods sovereignty (36.22-26, at the conclusion of his
statement to Job); 37.14-24 (to Job, stressing human limitations vis--vis the
Creator in hymnic style).
Job 32
ELIHUS FIRST ADDRESS (VV. 6-22)
AFTER THE PROSE INTRODUCTION (VV. 1-5)
This, in the form of the sages introduction to the statement of his opinion, his
title to be heard, the reason for his intromission, namely, the inadequacy or
arguments hitherto adduced to counter Jobs controversial statements, the
compulsion of the truth he feels, and the assurance of his impartiality, is in the
true style of sapiential dialectic. The speech may be divided into three
strophes: vv. 6-9, 15-16 + 11-14, and 17-22.
The sudden switch to the 3rd person plur. in v. 15, after the 2nd plur. in vv.
11-14, and the reversion to the helplessness of Jobs friends in the argument
indicates that this passage is displaced. Duhm suggested that it stood originally
after v. 9, which is certainly a much more appropriate place, and that v. 10 is a
gloss, which is supported by the repetition of the verse at v. 17a. Hence the
arrangement which we adopt: vv. 6-9 (10); 15-16 + 11-14; and 17-22.
Chapter 32
1.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
1
Now these three men gave up answering Job since he was convinced of his
innocence. 2. Then the anger of Elihu the son of Barachel the Buzite of the
family of Ram was kindled; and he was angry because he justied himself rather
than God. 3. And he was angry with Jobs three friends because they had found
no answer (to him) and had made God1 seem unjust. 4. But Elihu had waited
while they spoke with Job2 for they were older than he. 5. But seeing that there
was no answer in the mouth of the three men, Elihu became angry.
Then up spoke Elihu the son of Barachel the Buzite and said:
I am young in years,
And you are aged,
Hence I was timid and afraid
To declare my opinion in your presence.3
I said, Let years speak,
and many years teach wisdom!
But it is the spirit of Yahweh4 in a human,
The breath of the Almighty, which gives him understanding.5
It is not merely the seniors who have wisdom,
Nor the elders who are discriminate in judgment.
Therefore I say, Listen to me;
Let me also declare my opinion.
394
15.
16.
11.
12.
13.
14.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
Job 32. Elihus First Address

They have been confounded; they have had no more to say in answer,
Word passed beyond them.
Had I to wait6 while they had nothing to say,
While they stood with nothing more to reply?
I waited indeed for what you had to say,
I listened7 while you gave your reasons,
While you searched out what you had to say;
And I gave heed to you,
And see! none convicted Job,
None of you had any answer for what he said.
Take care not to say, We have encountered (such) wisdom
That (only) God may refute him and not a human.
But I will not marshal8 arguments like these,9
Nor will I answer him with your statements.
I too will give my share of the answer;
I too will declare my opinion.
For I am full10 of words,
The spirit within me constrains me.
Indeed my belly is like wine unopened,
Like wine-skins which new wine bursts.11
I must speak that I may nd relief;
I must open my lips that I may give an answer.
I would show partiality to none,
Nor give attering titles to any one,
For I do not know how to conceal (the truth),
Else soon would my Maker take me off.

1.
MT is a scribal adjustment (tiqqn serm) for doctrinal reasons; understand God
for Job.
Conjecturing beabberm e-iyyb for MT e-iyy bierm.
Reading itteem for MT eeem. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yhwh for MT h.
Reading tenenn in agreement with the sing. en for MT tenm.
Reading hahalt for MT wehalt.
Reading aazn with certain Heb. MSS for MT zn.
Reading eer with S for MT ra, assuming haplography of initial after
preceding l.
9. Reading kelleh after LXX for MT lay, k being omitted by haplography after initial
k in the preceding word, and h being corrupted to y in the Old Heb. script.
10. Reading ml with certain Heb. MSS for MT ml.
11. Reading ken tr yiqa. See Commentary ad loc.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
1. For MT benyw one Heb. MS, LXX, Sym. and S read benhem (in their
eyes), signifying that the friends had admitted Jobs innocence and in so
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395
doing had made God seem unjust (v. 3), where MT Job is a scribal adjustment (tiqqn serm) for doctrinal purposes. Since Elihus argument,
however, is directed against Job as well as his friends, we accept MT as referring to Jobs stubborn stand on his innocence. Elihu does not upbraid the
friends for their acquiescence in Jobs case but for their failure to nd
adequate objections to it (vv. 3, 5; cf. v. 13).
2. Elihus fathers name Barachel may denote a sapiential school rather than
an actual family afnity, but Buzi may be articial, borrowed from Gen.
22.21, where Buz is associated with Uz, being located by Jer. 25.23 with
Teima and Dedan.
4. MT ikkh e-iyy bierm, if not unintelligible, is awkward, and
Wrights conjecture ikkh beabberm e-iyy (waited while they spoke
with Job) is followed by most modern commentators. Hlscher omits with
Job against the evidence of MT and the ancient versions.
6. wayyaan here as in the Ras Shamra texts means probably spoke up, not
replied, though Elihus speech is actually a reply to the case of Job and his
friends.
yem (aged) is found in the sing. form y only once (2 Chron. 36.17)
outside Job; cf. 12.12, where the word has a nuance of its primary sense
decrepit, and in 15.10; 29.8. See on 12.12.
zal, here the parallel of yr, suggests the late Aram. deal (to fear),
but the form zeal (to fear) is actually attested in the Aram. inscription of
Zakir (I,13) (Gibson 1975: 8). The verb zal is attested in Classical Heb.
describing the motion of reptiles (e.g. Deut. 32.24 and Mic. 7.17). Fohrer (ad
loc.) takes the verb in Job 32.6 to be from this root, meaning to shrink. This
is questionable, and seems to be contradicted by S, which renders dal (I
feared), though Syr. has another root from which dal (locust) is derived.
The connection of Heb. zal describing the motion of reptiles and of zal in
Job 32.6 with Arab. zaala (to withdraw, slip [of a landslide]) is possible,
but not certain. We prefer to regard zal in Job 32.6 as a homonym of Heb.
zal describing the motion of reptiles, cognate with Aram. and Syr. deal and
with the early Aram. zehal of the Zakir inscription (c. 800 BCE).
iwwh, relatively frequent in the Elihu passages (e.g. vv. 10, 17; 36.2, 6),
is the regular Aram. verb to declare, being found only twice in the OT (Pss.
19.3; 52.11) outside Job except in the Aram. part of Dan. It is unlikely that
there is any connection with Arab. waa(y) (to suggest, insinuate).
da (knowledge) for the more regular daa is a peculiarity of the Elihu
passages and one of the linguistic features which sets it apart in the Book of
Job. aww d might be taken as meaning to inform so making possible a
direct accusative eeem, but the more normal reading would be itteem (in
your presence).
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8. niema adday in v. 8b demands a divine name after ra in the parallel

position in v. 8a, where Sym. suggests l or elah for MT, but h yhwh would
be nearer MT. The divine proper name is avoided in the Book of Job as distinct
from the prose Prologue and Epilogue except in 12.9, where it is the citation of
a common compound expression. The use of yhwh in the compound expression ra yhwh would be analogous to ya yhwh in 12.9. The argument here
may be that only a special divine inspiration gives Elihu a right to speak in
face of the empirical wisdom of the elders, but the parallelism of ra and
nemh indicates that this was not a special revelation, but the common share
of the spirit (ra) with which God animated humanity at creation. Elihu is
then claiming that this spirit in any person may transcend the advantage of age
and empirical wisdom. This general portion of the spirit in humans is taken by
Dhorme in justication of MT. Even so, the ra is ra yhwh.
9. For rabbm, r yamm is proposed after S, which is the general sense also
of LXX and V. The parallel zeqnm indicates that this is certainly the meaning.
Dahood, however (UHP, p. 71) cites a passage in the Ras Shamra texts
(Gordon, UT 51 V, 65-66), which supports MT in this sense:
rbt ilm lkmt
bt dqnk ltsrk
Thou art aged, O El, and truly wise,

The grey hair of your beard indeed instructs you.
Cf. Gen. 25.23, werab yaa r (and the elder shall serve the younger).
10. aawweh d a-n is repeated in v. 17, and emphasizes the personal
contribution of the writer to supplement the argument of the friends in the
dialogue, though this verse is probably a later gloss on da and iwwh; see
on v. 6.
15-16. On the displacement of text, see Introduction to ch. 32.
15. heeq (to pass, go beyond) is attested in the narrative of the wandering
of the patriarchs in Gen. 12.8; 26.22.
11. zn is generally taken as an elision of aazn (actually found in certain
Heb. MSS), the Hiphil imperfect of the denominative verb from zen (ear).
Dahood has suggested (1963c: 38) that the verb may be a homonym (to
weigh, ponder), found in Eccl. 12.9 as a parallel to iqqr and tiqqn. Arab.
wazana has also a mental sense; cf. awzana nafahu alay ayyi(n) (he
applied his mind to something), where the use of the causative as in the
present passage is interesting. The preference cannot be certainly decided. The
plur. ten suggests the meaning various reasons. milln, again the Aram.
word and plur. ending, indicates here not the mots justes, but the substance of
the words and arguments.
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397
12. oa means here to bring ones guilt home to him. Sometimes this
denotes the process of argument and criticism; at other times, as here, it
denotes the end of the process, conviction.
13. This colon is ambiguous. According to NEB the meaning is Take care then
not to claim that you have found wisdom; God will rebut him, not man. It is
not clear, however, whether God will rebut him is the conclusion of the
wisdom the friends claim or is the independent statement of Elihu. Alternatively it may mean that in Jobs statements the friends admit to have encountered (mn) wisdom which only God can refute, and so are content to
leave it to God to do so. On this interpretation Elihu implies that he has sufcient sapiential acumen to answer Job without invoking divine intervention.
In this case, as Peake suggested, the Elihu addendum here might be an
animadversion on the resort to the theophany and Divine Declaration in 38.1
40.14, which went beyond the strictly sapiential tradition. If so this would be a
strong argument for the originality of that passage. However that may be, the
sequel indicates that Elihu is condent in his own sapiential acumen to answer
Job without invoking divine intervention. In this context m denotes not
found but lighted upon, encountered.
na means to drive in Classical Heb., but rather in the sense of to
disperse; the Arab. cognate, however, means to drive a beast forcibly, and
this may be the sense here, the reference being to Gods relentless prosecution
of his argument with Job, which could also be expressed by the verb ra
which one Heb. MS reads. The prosecution of the case thus left to God is
actually carried on in 38.140.14. Alternatively the verb may be pointed
yeappenn, a cognate of Arab. daffa, in the IInd Form to despatch a
wounded man, hence meaning in the present passage to nish off.
14. wel-ra-lay milln (but he has not directed his arguments against
me) might be defended on the interpretation that Job has not had Elihu to
contend with, who has arguments more effective than those of the friends, and
are to be much more systematically arranged and presented. The same ultimate
sense may be secured by reading eer with S for MT ra. LXX such things
indicates a reading kelleh for MT lay, indicating haplography of k after the
preceding word. Arguments like these may refer to the friends dependence
on God for a conviction of Job which they have not been able to secure.
17. On iwwh and da see on v. 6.
18. ra bin (lit. the spirit of my belly) may mean simply the spirit with
me; cf. Arab. abana (to keep within one) and baanyu(n) (esoteric).
19. In v. 19a l yippta means wine which is not yet opened. The real
problem lies in v. 19b, MT ke am yibbqa. The only apparent
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subject of the sing. verb is bin, which is fem. The agreement -am is
also highly suspect. is known in the OT as familiar spirit or revenant
and not as skin bottle, which is generally assumed here. Thus scribal corruption may be suspected. LXX like smiths bellows suggests the reading
kemappa rm yibbqa (as smiths bellows [sing.] are like to burst).
The parallel, however, indicates rather ken tr yiqa (like wineskins
which new wine bursts). For n cf. Josh. 9.4, 13.
20. The impersonal verb yirwa means to nd relief; cf. Arab. ra, yaru
in the II Form.
21. n pnm means to lift the face, that is, to show partiality; see on
13.8. kannh means to address by ones title (Arab. kunyatu[n]), a title of
honour or a byname, often son of a (famous) father or father of a (distinguished or rst-born) son. The verb is attested of a worshipper being called
by the name of his God in Isa. 44.5; 45.4, and of Baal called the son of
Dagan, which means also corn in Ps. 65.10, tkn denm k n eneh,
which we emend to read tn denh k kn eenneh (You prepare its corn
according to your patronymic). This is the Heb. adaptation of a Canaanite
psalm with this among other features barely distinguished.
21-22. The two couplets are arranged in chiastic parallelism. Thus there is a
word-play between e pnm in v. 21a and yin in v. 22b. Possibly
there is also a word-play between akanneh in v. 22b and aanneh in v. 22a,
where we suggest that the verb is cognate with Arab. kanna (to conceal). The
statement of Elihus inability to conceal the truth would thus accord with his
statement that he is likely to burst with it (vv. 19-20).
Job 33
ELIHUS FIRST STATEMENT
This statement is addressed to Job and falls into ve strophes (vv. 1-7, 8-12,
13-18, 19-24, 25-30) according to the subject matter and stages of Elihus
argument. Verses 31-33 are probably displaced in MT. The literary form
throughout is the sapiential disputation.
The rst strophe (vv. 1-7) is the speakers introduction of himself, with the
characteristic statement of the Hebrew sage that he proposes to dispute the
case not on the basis of revelation but of humanistic experience and argumentation (vv. 5, 6, 4, 7). In the second strophe (vv. 8-12) he cites Jobs thesis
and in fact his actual statements (vv. 8-11) in order to refute them (v. 12). In
the third strophe (vv. 13-18) he again cites Jobs words (v. 13) and develops
his rst antithesis that, far from persecuting the sufferer, God persists in his
efforts to save humans from the fatal consequences of his own sin, warning
them and stirring their conscience in the privacy of their own thoughts (vv. 1418). In the fourth strophe (vv. 19-24) this theme is further developed, sickness
being a token of Gods persistence to warn humans to seek his grace, which is
available through angelic intercession (vv. 23-24). The fth strophe (vv. 2530) emphasizes that the reaction of the sufferer should be penitence and
prayer; Gods grace is thus accessible and his ultimate purpose is the individuals good.
The arrangement of the text is in our opinion generally in good order, but
v. 4 may be displaced in MT from after v. 6, where it better describes the
animation of humans after their creation from the common clay (v. 6). Verse
23c was probably followed by a colon reading And to show him his sin, as
read by LXX, and a verb is probably missing at the beginning of v. 24. The
various addresses of Elihu do not normally end with a call to hear, as in vv.
31-33, and those verses are almost certainly displaced. Fohrer has noted that,
exceptionally, ch. 35 lacks the customary introduction in this style, and
proposes that 33.31-33 is displaced from the beginning of ch. 35. This is the
more likely because ch. 34 is not addressed to Job, but to the wise men at
large, whereas ch. 35 resumes the address to Job directly in the 2nd person
sing., like 33.31-33, with a citation of Jobs thesis followed by Elihus
antithesis.
With supreme self-condence Elihu pronounces on the debate in the
Dialogue, beginning rst with Jobs assertions. He questions Jobs claim to
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Job 33. Elihus First Statement
innocence (v. 9) with the conclusion that his sufferings signify the wrath of
God. On this assumption Jobs contention with God according to the canon of
human justice is berated on the grounds that God is greater than man (v. 12).
He next objects to Jobs complaint that his divine opponent does not answer
him in response to his claims on legal grounds. God does indeed, Elihu asserts,
respond to humans, for instance, in their disturbed conscience, when they with
consternation (terror, v. 16) become aware of the will of God with which
their begetting propensity to sin is recognized to be at variance. The response
of God to a persons spiritual need rather than to ones demand for justice is to
arrest the development from evil propensity to overt sin, with its fatal
consequences (vv. 17f.). Or again God may arrest a persons sinful propensity
or actual sin by sickness (vv. 19-22). This, it is implied, need not drive one to
complain of Gods injustice, as if one had a legal claim on him, but should
rather direct one to hope for Gods mercy, encouraged by the interest of an
angelic intermediary who may quicken the conscience and declare to a man
his duty, which may be presented to God as ransom for ones life (vv. 23-24).
God is thus presented as no judge exulting in the death of a sinner, but as
concerned to divert a person from the path to which ones evil propensity may
lead one, and ready to admit a plea for mercy, even taking the initiative
through an angelic intermediary. The one thus rescued will seek Gods continued favour in prayer and nd joy in his presence (v. 26), dwelling upon the
deliverance from sin and its fatal consequences and, to use the convention
in the Plaint of the Sufferer, giving public testimony to the grace of God
(vv. 27-28).
Chapter 33
1.
2
3.
5
6.
4.
7.
8.
9.
But listen, Job, to my words,

And give ear to what I say.
Behold, I have opened my mouth,
My tongue in my palate has spoken.
There are in my heart words of knowledge;1
My lips have spoken sincerely.
Answer me if you can;
Marshal your arguments; take your stand.
I am related to God in the same degree as yourself,
I too was nipped off from the clay.
It was the spirit of God that made me,
And the breath of the Almighty gave me life.
Indeed no terror of me need appal you,
Nor shall my hand2 be heavy upon you.
But you have said in my hearing,
And I have heard you distinctly say,3
I am pure, without sin,
I am clean, without iniquity.
The Book of Job

10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28
29.
30.
1
In fact he nds occasions4 against me,

He counts me as his enemy.
He sets5 my feet in the stocks,
Watches all my paths.
See, in this you are not right. My answer is
That God is greater than humans.
Why do you object to him
That he gives no answer to (ones) words?
For in one way God speaks,
Yea in two he indicates (his will):6
In a dream, in a night-vision7
[When deep sleep falls on humans,]8
In slumber on ones bed.
Then he uncovers the ear of humans,
And in their conscience9 terries them,10
To turn them aside from what they would do,11
And to cut away12 pride13 from a person,
To keep back ones life from the Pit,
And ones vitality from passing through the stream (of death),
Or the person is chastened with pains on his bed,
And the quaking in his bones is perpetual,
And his life loathes14 bread,
And his very being appetizing food.
His esh is wasted15 away so that it cannot be seen,16
And his bones are laid bare, lacking moisture.17
And his life draws nigh18 to the pit,
And his vitality is dead.19
If there is an angel by him,
A mediator, one of a thousand,
To declare to a man his duty,
20 and to seek mercy for him, saying,21

Set him free22 that he go not down to the pit.
I have found a ransom for his life.23
His esh shall become plumper24 than in his childhood,
And will be restored as in the days of his youth.
He will pray to God that he may show him favour,25
And he may see26 his face with joy:
And he may restore27 a mans innocence to him,
So that he may sing28 before men, saying,29
I sinned and perverted the right,
And he did not requite30 me according to my sin.31
He redeemed my soul32 so that it passed not to the Pit,
And my life33 shall be illumined34 by the light.
All these things indeed God does,
Twice, yea thrice with a man,
To bring back his soul from the Pit
To enjoy the light in the land35 of life.
401
402

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
Reading y belibb imer daa for MT yer-libb amry weaa, prepositional b

in belibb being corrupted to r and attached wrongly to y.
Reading weapp with LXX for MT weap and, in agreement, tib for MT yib.
Lit. the sound of your words, reading mill for milln after LXXA and S.
Reading tan for MT ten.
Reading ym for MT ym.
Reading lrenn, with emphatic le, for MT l yerennh. See Commentary ad
loc.
Reading beezyn with S and certain Heb. MSS and MT ezyn.
Omitting v. 15b (when deep sleep falls upon humans) as a gloss after 4.13.
emusrm with Aq., S, T, and V for MT emsram.
Reading yeattm with LXX, Aq. and S for MT yatm.
Reading mimmaah with S, T, and V for MT maaeh.
Reading yish for MT yeasseh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading weaawh for MT wewh.
Reading wezihamh for MT wezihamatt. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yileh for MT yiel.
Reading mre for MT mr.
Reading r for MT ru. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading weiqra for MT wattiqra.
Reading lem mm for MT lamemim. See Commentary ad loc.
Perhaps a word has dropped out here.
Reading wunnenn weymar for MT wayyeunnenn wayymer.
Reading preh with two Heb. MSS for MT peh. See Commentary ad loc.
Inserting lena after ker, metri causa, na being omitted by haplography
before raa.
Reading yipa for MT ruaa. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading weyih for MT wayyirh.
Reading weyireh for MT wayyar.
Reading wey for MT wayye.
Reading yr for MT yr.
Reading weymar for MT wayymer.
Reading iwwh for MT wh.
Reading kaawni with LXX.
Reading na with Kethib as against Qere.
Reading ayy with Kethib as against Qere.
Reading tr for MT tireh.
Reading ber for MT ber. See Commentary ad loc.
The length of v. 3a and that of v. 3b in the arrangement of MT in BH3 is
respectively too short and too long. This is adjusted by pointing MT amry
weaa as imer aa, which belongs to v. 3a (so Wright, Duhm, Beer,
DriverGray, Ball, Hlscher, Dhorme, Mowinckel, Fohrer, Terrien, Lvque).
1
The Book of Job
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The verb is obtained by emending yr. Dhorme reads yr, for which he
assumes the meaning repeats, citing vv. 14 and 17 and Hos. 14.9all very
doubtful evidence. Alternatively yr (sings) is proposed (Terrien), with
nothing in the parallel colon to support it. The same remark applies to Duhms
proposal to read yq (overows, as wine vats; cf. Joel 2.24), which Fohrer
adopts, and to Beers proposal rha (is stirred), which is preferred by G.B.
Gray; cf. Driver, who preferred yq. The parallel, referring to a pure declaration, indicates that Hlscher is much nearer the truth in proposing yr, the
Hiphil of rar; cf. Syr. erar (to be rm, true), which is accepted by
Mowinckel. If this is the verb we suggest that it is better taken in the Qal with
imer aa as adverbial accusative (My heart is fortied with words of
knowledge). But the simplest and probably the most apt reading is that of
Ball, y belibbi imer aa (There are in my heart words of knowledge),
which we adopt. This involves one of the most natural scribal errors, the
corruption of b to r, probably in the Old Hebrew script.
4. This verse interrupts the sequence of thought between v. 3 and v. 5, and it
has been taken as a gloss inspired by 32.8 (so Budde, Duhm, Hlscher).
Dhorme, however, has perceived that it ts aptly between v. 6 and v. 7; cf.
MacFadyen (1917: 82), and Steinmann (1955: 211), who transpose v. 4 to
before v. 6. Dhormes arrangement, where the order of physical creation
followed by divine animation preserves the tradition of Genesis, is to be
preferred.
5. Dhorme doubts if ereh, the imperative of ra, means marshal your
arguments here, as it does in 32.14 and 13.18 and 23.4. Certainly Job does not
address Elihu, but Elihu nevertheless does summarize Jobs answers. Dhorme
takes the verb in the military sense (metaphorically) (cf. 6.4), and cites in
support 38.3 and 40.7. The last two passages, however are not military metaphors perhaps, but rather a gure from the primitive practice of belt-wrestling
as a trial by ordeal, known in Mesopotamian law in the fourteenth century BCE
at Nuzi (Gordon 195051). hiya may refer to this practice, but it may also
be a legal term, to take ones stand at the bar or in the dock, to answer
charges, as han in the parallel colon suggests.
6. ll is not for God (so Dhorme, Hlscher, Mowinckel, Fohrer, Lvque),
nor like God (Terrien), but rather vis--vis God (so Dhorme, Weiser), i.e.
as created and animated by him, as the context indicates.
MT ke does not require emendation to km as is suggested in BH3.
Dhorme cites Ass. k p (like), and ke (in proportion to) as familiar in
Classical Heb., for example, ke oel (Exod. 16.21), kei nyw (Lev.
25.52), hence we render I am related to God in the same degree as yourself.
mmer qrat (I was nipped off from the clay) recalls the creation of
the man Enkidu in the Mesopotamian Gilgamesh epic (I.ii.34), where the god
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404
pinched off clay and cast it in the steppe. The same verb is used in the Ras
Shamra text Gordon UT 127.27ff., where the god El moulds a gure in clay or
dung for use in apotropaic magic.
4. For the order of the verse and its signicance in the argument, see Introduction to ch. 33.
7. Elihu refers obliquely to Jobs objection that God puts him out of countenance with terror (9.34; 13.21). mh, actually mh, is a very strong word
and poetic, usually expressing terror inspired by God hence it is appropriate
here, where Elihu is insisting that he as a man like Job and, in the characteristic sapiential tradition, was condent in the adequacy of human reason to
adjust Job to his circumstances.
For ap LXX indicates the reading kapp (my hand), which would involve
the further emendation of yib to tib. V arranges the letters of MT ap
to read a p (naymy mouth), and S and T also retain MT. S interprets the
word as concern for me after a root kp in the Syr. dialect, and renders my
burden, which suggests that MT ap is a noun ee (a hapax legomenon in
the OT) with the pronominal sufx. ee might be derived from the verb
a (to compel, Prov. 16.26). This word is known in Late Heb., Aram.,
Syr, and Arab., as may be assumed from the Arab. akfu(n) (pack-saddle).
The reading of LXX, however, is supported by the language of Job 13.21:
kappe mlay haraq
weme al-teaaann.
8. On the reading mill for MT milln, see Textual Note. The Aram. word is
again used.
9. The meaning of the hapax legomenon a is not in doubt in this context
owing to the parallelism with za (pure) and the antithesis with wel wn
l (nor have I sin). It is well attested in Late Heb. in the root a (to wash
the head) and as in Syr., into which the root probably came through Ass.
from Akk., where Dhorme cites the root pa (to clean).
10. hn here means indeed, in fact; cf. Arab. inna.
MT ten would be derived from a verbal root n, which is attested in
Akk. and Arab. meaning to oppose. The verb yim, however, does not
suggest this verbal noun opposition as an object, since this would proceed
from God, who would then have no need to discover it. Thus, following S and
Rashi, we may read tan (from nh, Arab. ana[y], to be seasonable),
hence occasions; cf. opportunities for a quarrel (Judg. 14.4). In v. 10b Elihu
quotes Job in 13.24b and, not so accurately, in 19.11b.
MT ym should be pointed ym. The verse cites 13.27, which see.
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12. For MT hn-z l aqt eenekk LXX implies a reading h tmar

aaqt l neh (How say you, I am right, I get no answer). But MT
requires no emendation, and is the more natural introduction to k and the rest
of v. 12b.
In v. 12b LXX He who is above mortals is eternal has suggested that MT
yirbeh may have been a corruption of kabbr. This is gratuitous. Even on this
interpretation yirbeh may be a byform of ra, from which ra is derived
meaning aged; cf. 32.9. In any case, whether as meaning aged or, as
probably, great, yirbeh must be preserved in view of the word-play between
it and r (contended) in v. 13.
13. For MT deryw V read der, which is feasible but unnecessary, since
the 3rd masc. sufx refers to en in v. 12b.
r (contend) in the sense to object is attested at Judg. 21.22.
14. One timetwo times means repeatedly; cf. Amos 1.3, 6, 9, 11, 13; 2.1,
4, 6 and other instances in the OT too numerous to mention. It is a convention
also used in Ugaritic poetry.
In MT itayim l yerennh, l, if negative, is difcult. The verb r is
known in Classical Heb., meaning to take note of, and is so taken here, with
l as negative, by Jerome in his commentary, and by T, which paraphrases
and he has no need to consider it. V and S, however, translate the verb as
repeat, evidently reading yeannennh, which is graphically feasible in the
Old Heb. script for yerennh in scriptio defectiva. Dhorme adopts this reading, which would be expressive of Gods peremptory and persistent declarations, citing 40.5, where wel s would correspond to l yeannennh in
33.14b. We suggest that MT yerennh is the energic form of the imperfect of
r, cognate here with Arab. ra, yaru, meaning in the IInd Form to point
out. We suggest further that the enclitic le, well known in Arab. and now also
in Ugaritic, has been misunderstood by Heb. scribes as the negative. Omitting
of MT l, we would read itayim lrennh, yea, in the two he indicates
(his will), the substance of which is given in the sequel. Fohrers interpretation, which assumes the indenite subject of the verb in the MT, is grammatically possible, but in the construction of the couplet it is very unlikely that the
subject should change so abruptly without being explicitly noted.
15. Elihu, like Eliphaz in 4.12ff., cites a theophany, which is introduced in v.
15a and b by a citation of 4.13, but the substance is much more positive.
Perhaps the verbal citation in v. 15b may be omitted as a gloss (so Hlscher,
Mowinckel, Fohrer). Here the theophany is an audition in a dream. The dream
has just such a signicance in the ancient Near East, as evidenced by the
plethora of omen texts from Mesopotamia, the reference to dreams and their
interpretation by prophetic gures in affairs of state in the Mari texts and by
the patriarchs in the early narratives of the Pentateuch (e.g. Gen. 20.3;
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28.12-15; 31.11ff.; 37.5-10) and in traditions of the reigns of Saul (1 Sam.

28.6) and of Solomon (1 Kgs 3.5-14). The great prophets of Israel were more
discriminating in their attitude to dreams as the medium of revelation, and did
not regard dreams as automatically genuine revelation, which might be
articially induced or arbitrarily interpreted (Deut. 13.1-5; Jer. 23.25-32).
Jeremiah, nevertheless, does admit the possibility of genuine revelation to a
prophet in dreams, which is admitted by Joel as a function of prophecy and the
consequence of the possession of the spirit (Joel 3.1f. [EVV 2.28f.]) and
regularly in apocalypticism. Even in so late and sophisticated a sage as Ben
Sira, who despised reliance on dreams as such (34.1-5) the possibility of a
genuine dream-revelation is admitted (34.6).
16. MT emsrm yatm means lit. and by their bonds seals (them),
which is obscure. Aq., V, S and T read emusrm (and by their admonition). The sense of yatm in this association is not clear, but the meaning of
v. 16 may be he opens the ear of men and seals it up again with admonitions
to them. But the ancient versions show a great measure of agreement in
variations from MT, especially Aq., LXX and S, in reading yeattm, the Hiphil
of a, meaning he frightens them. LXX, in reading with appearances
of fear, seems to conate two variants of MT musrm, namely, marm
(appearances, visions) and mrm (terrors). Neither the one nor the other
is what is expected as the medium of revelation mentioned in v. 16a, so we
follow Aq., V, S, and T and with slight variation read emusrm, which is
identical with MT so far as consonants are concerned. But with Dahood
(1963c: 35) we take msr as the seat of admonition from the verb ysar (to
admonish, discipline); cf. Ps. 16.7, yissern kilyy (my reins have admonished me), a vivid description of the action of conscience, which has a parallel
in the Ugaritic legend of Krt, Gordon UT 127,26 wywsrnn ggnh (and his
inwards admonish him). Hence, reading emusrm yeattm, we render
and in their conscience he terries them. This gives in conscience an organ
of the divine revelation parallel to the ear of humans in the parallel colon.
17. The purpose of the theophany is so that the evil purposes of humans
may not be brought to effect. With S, T, V and most moderns we read
mimmaah.
In v. 17b gaaw (his pride) should certainly be read for MT gwh
(body).
Dhorme reverses the order of maah (MT maaeh) and gaawh (MT
gwh), rendering turning man from pride, hiding his action from man. This
is not supported by any of the versions and Dhormes second colon introduces
a concept foreign to the purpose of the revelation. The verse is improved if,
with the two emendations proposed, the Qal yisa is read (so Beer, Hlscher,
Fohrer), a verb also attested in Aram. and Syr.; cf. Arab. kasaa (to sweep
away).
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18. The parallel with aa (pit) has suggested the emendation of MT

bala (pausal) to biel (so Duhm, Hlscher). Dhorme proposes that ela
here means grave-shaft; cf. ela in Neh. 3.15 and Isa. 8.6 (the Siloam
tunnel) and Ass. ilitu (canal). But in these cases the root meaning of the
verb from which they are derived means to distribute, and they denote not a
vertical shaft but a horizontal distribution of water. Hence our preference for
the stream of death; cf. NEB the river of death, recalling the waters of
death in the Gilgame Epic (so Tsevat [1954: 43], and Rin [1963], who takes
the word to refer, by synecdoche, generally to the underworld; see also Pope).
The sage in the Elihu addendum is using the same poetic licence as the
Christian hymnologist in speaking of deaths cold, sullen stream. The word
may have this sense in the Ugaritic legend of Krt in the phrase bl ttpl
describing deaths in the royal family by various means or by various expressions. There it has been taken to mean a weapon, a sword (Caquot, Sznycer
and Herdner 1974: 506) or spear (Gibson 1978: 82), taking l as cognate of
Arab. ilu(n) (sword); cf. G.B. Gray and Fohrer on Job 33.18, where
Fohrer translates ar beela (running on the spear). But in the Ugaritic
text l might equally well mean the stream of death. In any case in the
passage in Job the parallel with aa indicates the underworld, aa being
parallel to el in Ps. 16.10.
19. For MT wer amyw n (Kethib) Dhorme cites the Akk. rbu (to
quake) (so G.R. Driver 1955: 73); cf. 4.14. tn is used of abiding or
perpetual, for example, in Num. 24.21, Jer. 5.15.
20. For MT wezihamatt we may read wezihamh. The verb, however, may take
a double accusative with ayy as the subject, though in this case the
translation his life makes him loathe his food is awkward. The verb is found
in the OT here and possibly, with restoration, in 6.7, on which see; but it also
has cognates in Aram. meaning dirty and in Syr. meaning putrid, stinking.
21. MT yiel should probably be read yileh (wastes away), the corruption
having probably occurred through scriptio defectiva. mr may mean so that
it is not seen, a case of privative min with a form of the verbal noun of rh.
The suggestion of Duhm to emend mr to mrez (by reason of emaciation) (cf. Buddes suggestion mrzn), while graphically feasible in the Old
Heb. script, misses a probable word-play between rh (to see) and rh, a
byform of rwh, a verb which is probably used in Prov. 23.31 and Ben Sira
34.28 (1962: 499-500). To these instances we should probably add Ps. 36.10
(EVV 9), imme meqr ayym biere nireh (for MT bere nireh-r),
For with thee is the source of life; from thy well we shall be satised. upp
is probably from h, which is known as meaning to be bare; cf. harnipeh (a bare mountain) in Isa. 13.2, and also Isa. 49.9; Jer. 3.2; 4.11; 7.29;
and 12.12, where it describes desert.
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22. w copula is to be read and not w consecutive. MT lamemim is read

lammemem as in RSV, which translates to those who bring death (so G.B
Gray, Terrien); cf. MacFadyen, to the angels of death, after LXX; so Fohrer,
translating the messengers of death in Prov. 16.14, and citing the analogy of
the seven evil demons, the slayers (muitti) of Assyrian superstition (so also
apparently Mowinckel), and of the n of the Prologue. But the parallelism
in our opinion supports the reading lem mm to the dead, that is, to the
place of the dead (so Hoffmann, Perles).
23. In this passage LXX is much fuller than MT, possibly indicating paraphrase,
and possibly a double translation of the Heb. text. It suggests that v. 23c may
be the rst colon of a couplet, the second of which read and to show him his
folly, but the known tendency of LXX to paraphrase and occasionally to
amplify must make this a matter of uncertainty. The Heb. text, however, has
been disturbed at this point, a verb having certainly been lost at the beginning
of v. 24, so that the loss of a colon after v. 23c is the more likely. In v. 23a
lyw may mean by (i.e. with) him; cf. l y (so Dhorme, citing 1 Kgs
22.19, m lyw mmn mieml). mal is well attested in the MT
and versions. Rowley, admitting that mal (messenger) may be human or
divine, opts for the former probably, with the function of interpreter (mli of
Gods will to humans and/or to express the case of a person to God, as the
melm (NEB spokesmen) in Isa. 43.27, where, however, the parallelism
indicates another reading and interpretation. But the gure of the n among
the celestials (ben elhm) and the celestials in 5.1 supports the celestial
rather than the human nature of the of mal in the present passage. The
gure of an intercessory angel emerges in the angel of Yahweh who intercedes for Jerusalem and the cities of Judah in Zech. 1.12f. Here the angel is
not the representative of the individual as in Job 33.23f., but his intercessory
function is the same as in Job. The passages in Zechariah (late sixth century
BCE) and the Elihu Addendum at least a century later are sufciently close for
the afnity to be signicant and sufciently removed to account for the
individualization of the conception of the angelic intercessor in Job 33.23f., a
sympathetic counterpart to the n among the celestials in the Prologue, a
gure with a function like that of Michael in Dan. 12.1 and in Apocalyptic in
the Apocrypha. Such a gure has a counterpart in the protecting gods of
households and individuals in Mesopotamia (Mowinckel 1925: 208), a gure
which also appears, signicantly for the passage in Job, in Mesopotamian
wisdom texts cited above (pp. 5-20), with its development in the conception of
the protecting or intercessory angel in later Judaism and Christianity (e.g. Mt.
18.10). The function of such a gure in the context of the plaint and purication rites of the sufferer in ancient Mesopotamia was to make their signicance with relation to the cause of them clear to the sufferer and also to help
to communicate the emotions, confessions and prayers of the sufferer to God,
hence the term ml (interpreter); cf. 16.20, where, however, it may be a
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corruption (see Commentary). In Elihus statement the function of the ml

was to interpret a persons sufferings as a divine discipline, recalling one to
ones duty, to point that person to the grace of God and to intercede for one
and to offer ransom for one, that is, possibly to represent to God the rites of
expiation as tokens of genuine contrition which will make redemption
effective (preh). T renders ml paraqla, the parekltos (advocate) of
Jn 14.16; cf. Richardson 1955: 169; Schedl 1942; Irwin 1962: 218.
As an angel (mal) was the proper mediator of Gods will to humans as
here and in Gen. 31.11 (E), he mediates also the needs of mortals to God (v.
24). ml, meaning here as in Gen. 42.23 an interpreter, refers to the dual
role of the mediator. This had been familiar in Israel in the role of the
prophets, who mediated the will of God to the community and the wishes and
disposition of the community to God. It was probably because of this institution in Israel that the conception of a supernatural intermediary did not
develop in Judaism until after the prophetic era in the late sixth century and
later. Though we compare the prophetic ofce to that of the supernatural ml
in Job 33.23 we do not subscribe to Dhormes view that mel in Isa. 43.27
denotes prophets, since we believe that, as the parallel suggests, ml
(parents) should be read.
The signicance of one of a thousand is not clear. The preposition does
not suggest that LXX is right in interpreting If ten thousand angels of death are
there (cf. v. 22) not one of them will hurt him A more legitimate interpretation would be to understand in parenthesis and there are 999 besides. The
phrase, however, is found in Eccl. 7.28, where it denotes the exception, as in
Ben Sira 6.6, The friends of your prosperity are many, but your intimate is
one of a thousand (eh mele). Assuming that this was a popular proverb,
the qualication of the mediator as one of a thousand may describe him as
sharing a persons intimate secret (s) and as exceptionally loyal. In v. 23c
yor would mean his uprightness, translated by Dhorme as his duty, that
is, what is proper for him; cf. yr in the sense of proper, parallel to dq in the
Ugaritic Legend of Krt (Gordon UT Krt, 12.13).
24. MT pe, if correct, would be a hapax legomenon. The general sense is
quite clear, and ker in the parallel colon supports a translation redeem.
This would naturally suggest ph (to set free by ransom), as S, T and V
understand. But this may be a coincidence. The letter is too distinctive to be
lost to any other in the context, but r may easily have been corrupted to d, so
perh may be read (free him), from pra (to break loose, Exod. 32.25)
used in the Hiphil meaning to set free in Exod. 5.4 (so Budde, Duhm,
Wright, Hlscher, Beer, Graetz, Weiser, Fohrer, Lvque). This is read by two
Heb. MSS. To meet Dhormes objection that the Qal of pra does not mean
to set free we may read the intensive (causative) preh; cf. Arab. faraa
(to free from work) meaning in the IVth Form to help in extremity. ker,
used of a bribe in 36.18; Amos 5.12; Prov. 6.35, means here rather a ransom.
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The word occurs in legal terminology, as in compensation for injury by a

goring ox (Exod. 21.30) or as an offering of propitiation after a census (Exod.
30.12) or as the ransom of an individual (Prov. 13.8; 21.18; Ps. 49.8f.). It is
not certain what ransom is envisaged in Job 33.24. The statement that this is
something the angel might nd for Job is equivocal since it is not stated that he
would nd it out of his own resources. The fact that the function of the angel
would be to convince a person of ones duty, that is, his tting relationship to
the will of God, would indicate that Jobs contrition evoked by the angel might
be the ransom found by him, as Lvque has suggested (1970: 55ff.).
25. MT ruaa might possibly be a metathetic cognate of Arab. arfaa (to be
convalescent), which would be quite apt in the context, though the imperfect
is demanded and the comparative min with nar precludes this. yira has
been proposed, meaning he will be fresher; cf. 8.16a, and Arab. raaba (to
be fresh, moist of fruit; so Dhorme, Tur-Sinai, G.B. Gray, Terrien). In this
case might have come in by dittography from b in the following word
ber. A more likely alternative to yira in our opinion is yipa (is
plump[er]; so Siegfried, Budde, Duhm, Beer, Hlscher, Lvque and evidently
NEB), which occurs in Ps. 119.70 in the sense gross.
26. ar is generally used in the Niphal, but is found in the Qal here and in
Gen. 25.21; Exod. 8.26; 10.18; Judg. 13.8. rh means granted favour
(rn); cf. Arab. raa(y). To see the face of a person means to be admitted
to ones presence (Gen. 32.21) as a mark of favour (Gen. 43.3, 5; 44.23, 26;
Exod. 23, 28; 2 Sam. 14.24, 28, 32; 2 Kgs 25.19; Est. 1.14). terh means
properly the shout of joy or triumph, hence generally joy. The association
here with seeing the face of God may reect the characteristic shout of
acclaim at the New Year festival which greeted the assurance of Gods
presence as King; cf. Ps. 47.6 (EVV 5), Yahweh has gone up with acclamation (bierh), where the verb corresponds to the more regular mla (he is
installed as King) in psalms which like Psalm 47 are from the liturgy of the
New Year festival. In v. 26b the subject of the verb (reading wey for MT
weyye) is God, who restores a persons innocence and proper (addq)
status in the sacral community.
27. The experience just described is that often expressed in the Plaint of the
Sufferer in the Psalms in a hymn of thanksgiving, which is the theme of vv.
26-27, where yr must be read for MT yr. The preposition al meaning
over against, hence before, may be attested in a similar context in the Ras
Shamra texts, where one sings l bl, possibly before Baal at a feast in his
honour (Gordon UT nt I, 20-21), though in the context the phrase may mean
about Baal. Verse 27b is a good instance of the use of yr (straight) and
wh (to be crooked) in their primary sense, though here also, of course,
with a moral signicance. In MT wel-wh, if the text is correct, the verb
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would be used impersonally (so Dhorme). But the metre demands an extra
beat, which is secured by pointing the verb as iwwh and the addition of
ea (so Bickell) or kaawn (so Duhm) after LXX. The verb in the Qal
means to be equal, comparable, and in the Intensive (Causative) is peculiarly
tting for the expression of retribution.
28. In the Qere of MT, where na and ayy were read, it has not been
understood that vv. 27-28 are a hymn of thanksgiving, and that hence the 1st
person must be read, as in Kethib.
29. On two, yea, three times, denoting repetition and continual activity, see
on v. 14; cf. Hos. 6.2:
After two days he will revive us,
On the third day he will raise us up.
The light symbolizes life in contrast to the darkness of death; cf. v. 28. MT
ber has been emended by Budde and Hlscher to lire after S, and Reiske
read beere (haayym) for MT ber, the land of the living being a familiar
phrase; cf. Ps. 27.13, heemant lire be-yhwh beere ayym. Ehrlich
reads lire ber beere haayym, which is metrically possible, if somewhat
cumbersome. Dhorme preserves MT, treating lr as the elided form of the
Niphal inn. constr. lehr; cf. 2 Sam. 2.32, where the verb is used impersonally, and Ps. 76.5, where, if MT is correct, it means enveloped in light. This,
with ere for r, is possibly the best reading. Dahood (1966: 222-23) has
questioned if r haayym in the Psalms should not be pointed as r
haayym (the land of the living); cf. Ps. 54.14, where S reads ere for r.
He adduces as evidence the phrase r kadm, where LXX reads chra
(region) for r, noting that Gen. 24.4, 7 specically notes North Mesopotamia as Abrahams birthplace, whereas Ur is in the South. The reading lr
ber haayym would give a word-play very characteristic of the Book of Job.
In the nal passage vv. 27f. reect the public acknowledgment of deliverance in the Plaint of the Sufferer in the cult.
Job 34
ELIHUS SECOND STATEMENT
Having directed his rst address to Job in order to demolish his case (ch. 33),
Elihu now turns ostensibly to his friends, but really to all interested in the
problem of the theodicy. His method and style are the same as in his rst
address, to state or explode Jobs theses (e.g. vv. 5, 9, 31-32), and then to state
and develop his own antitheses. This is done progressively and systematically
in the convention of the sapiential disputation in ve strophes after the
introduction (vv. 2-4), viz. vv. 5-9; 10-15; 16-19, 29c-30, 20-22, 25; 23-24,
26-29b; 31-37.
In the rst strophe of his argument (vv. 5-9) directed against Jobs persistent refusal to be admonished either by mental or by physical distress, he cites
Jobs thesis (vv. 5-6) and condemns him for subscribing to the view of the
godless (vv. 7-8) and for his cynical conclusion that conduct which ought to
please God is a matter of indifference to him (v. 9). He berates Jobs rejection
of orthodox arguments, so often given in mockery (v. 7), as in his citation of
the prosperity of the wicked (21.7-34), with his mockery of the proverbs of the
wise in support of the theodicy (21.17f.). Such conduct associates Job with the
wicked (v. 8; cf. Ps. 1.1), as does his statement a person has no prot from
pleasing God (v. 9), perhaps citing Jobs questioning of Gods countenancing
the prosperity of the wicked in 21.14, a sentiment implied in his statement that
God destroys both the innocent and the guilty (9.22f.). In the second strophe
(vv. 10-15) Elihu asserts the doctrine of the theodicy; God, to whom justice is
relevant, cannot be accused of injustice (vv. 10-12), perhaps recalling Gen.
18.25 (Shall not the judge of all the earth do what is just?); God, on whom
all being depends, cannot be called to account by any of his creatures (vv. 1315). In the third strophe (vv. 16-19, 29c-30, 20-22, 25) the idea of God as the
upholder of Order, the theme of the Enthronement Psalms, is taken as axiomatic, in support of which an appeal is made to general experience in history
with the rise and fall of dynasties, with possible reference to the dynastic
turmoils in northern Israel, Assyria and Babylon. The reference to the removal
of the strong one by no (human) hand (v. 20c) and sudden death at midnight
may refer to the destruction of Sennacheribs army (2 Kgs 19.35) or the
tradition of the sudden death of the rst-born of the Egyptians in the Passover
legend. In the fourth strophe (vv. 23-24, 26-29b) Elihu animadverts on Jobs
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appeal for God to set an appointment for a hearing and opportunity for
justication, which is implied in the oath of purgation; and in the fth strophe
(vv. 31-37) he states that it is not for Job to make this demandGod alone
may decide the moment of such an encounter and the extent of his retribution,
independently of all extenuating circumstances one may adduce (vv. 31-33).
Finally Jobs wealth of argument against the theodicy, not without reduction to
absurdity, no less than his sin, which Elihu like Jobs friends deduce from his
suffering, is roundly condemned (vv. 36-37).
The order of the text is generally well preserved, but in its place in MT vv.
23-24 on the subject of divine retribution, the theme of vv. 26ff., break the
sequence of thought on the omniscience of God and the impossibility of
evading detection, which is the theme of vv. 21-22 and v. 25, hence v. 25 is
displaced from after v. 22. Verse 29c is suspect in its present position and in
sense seems to belong to the odd colon at the end of v. 19. So far as subject
matter is concerned, vv. 29c and 30a could be read as an apposite couplet:
29c. And over nations and persons alike he watches,
30. That there should rule no impious man to ensnare the people.
Verse 30, however, is too long for a single colon, and v. 30b is too short, so
that the verse, though probably following the couplet vv. 19c + 29c, is either a
gloss or a fragmentary piece of text. There is probably the lacuna of a colon
before v. 10a, which after 34.34 may be restored:
ln amm haazn
weane l ime l.
Chapter 34
1.
And Elihu spoke:
2.
Hear my words, you wise men,

And, you who have knowledge, give ear to me.
For the ear tests words,
As the palate tastes food.1
Let us test for ourselves what is right,
Let us determine among ourselves what is good.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
For Job has said, I am innocent,

But God has dismissed my case;
Despite my just case I am smitten with pain,2
My wound3 is sore though I have done no wrong.
What man is like Job,
Who drinks up scofng like water?
Who goes in company with workers of wrong,
Walking with wicked men?
For he has said, A man has no prot
From discharging his obligations to God.
414
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
29c.
30.
20.
21.
22.
25.
23.
24.
26.
27.
28.
29.
Job 34. Elihus Second Statement

Therefore, [wise men, give ear],4
Men of understanding hear me.
Far be it from God to do evil,5
And from the Almighty6 to pervert the right.7
But according to the work8 of each man he requites him,
And according to a mans ways he makes him go through with it.
Assuredly God does no wrong,9
Nor does the Almighty pervert justice.
Who gave him orders over his own earth,10
And who has held him liable for the whole world?
If he should take back11 his spirit12 to himself,
And gather his breath to himself,
All esh together would perish,
And humanity would return to dust.
So if you have understanding13 listen to this,
Give ear to the sound of my words.
Shall one who hates government govern?
Do you convict of wickedness the Just and Mighty One?
He it is who says14 to a king, Worthless!,
To nobles, Wicked!,
Who shows no partiality to nobles,
Nor regards the noble more than the poor,
For they are all the work of His hands;
And over nations and men alike He watches,15
Lest an impious man rule,
One of those who would ensnare the people and wrong them.16
Suddenly they die at midnight,
The notables are shaken17 and pass away;
The strong one is removed18 by no (human) hand;
For his eyes are on the ways of a man,
And he marks all his steps.
There is no darkness or gloom
Where the workers of iniquity may be hidden,
But he notes their works,
He overwhelms them19 in a night and they are crushed.
But not on any mans account is there an appointed time20
For one to go before God with a case.
He shatters the mighty without investigation,
Setting21 others in their place.
On the scene of their crime22 he strikes them,
Where others may gloat over them,23
Because they turned from following him,
And had no consideration for his ways,
To bring before him the cry of the poor,
So that he might hear the cry of the aficted.
Then if he keep silent25 who can move him?26
If he avert his face, who can make him turn again?27
The Book of Job

31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
415
If one were to say to God,28

I have been seduced,29 I am not liable;30
So that I may see31 do thou instruct me.
If I have done wrong I will do so no longer.
Is it on your initiative that he should requite you32 seeing that you33 have rejected
him?
For the choice (of your course) was yours not his.34
[Say what you know.]35
Men of understanding will admit to me,
Even a wise man, who will listen to me,
That Job does not speak with knowledge,
And his words are not with insight.
36May Job be tried to the end
For answering like wicked men;
Because he adds to his sin,
Denying sin in our midst,
And speaks volubly37 his words against God.

1.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
1
Reading yu (pausal) for mt y (see Commentary ad loc.)

Reading el with LXX, S, and V for MT leel.
Reading e for MT aazz. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading maa for MT i.
Reading ln amm aazn / weane l ime l.
Reading mrea for MT mrea.
Reading leadday for MT weadday.
Reading mawwl eeq after LXX for MT mwel; cf. v. 12. See Commentary ad
loc.
Reading k keal with LXX and S for MT k pal.
Reading yira for MT yara.
Reading arh; cf. one Heb. MS (ar) for MT arh.
Reading y with certain Heb. MSS, LXX, and S for MT ym.
Omitting libb, metri causa. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading han with LXX, Aq., Sym., S, T and V for MT bn.
Reading hmr with LXX, S, V and one Heb. MS for MT haamr.
Reading yeeeh, an Aram. form of Heb. yeazeh, for MT ya (pausal form).
If MT mimmqe m is not a gloss, the metre demands an extra word to complete
the colon, such as meaqqem, if we may suggest a word which might easily have
been omitted by haplography after mqe am. This would be such an assonance as
the writer of Job favoured.
Reading yea m for MT yea m. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading weysr for MT weysr.
Reading waham with S for MT weha.
Reading k l al- m for MT k l al- ym , assuming dittography of
y and s of and erroneous grouping of m with y and s instead of with
corrupted to MT .
Reading weyaam for MT wayyaam.
Reading rim for MT rem.
416
23. Adding alhem after rm, metri causa, alhem possibly being omitted by
dittography before al-aer in v. 27. See Commentary ad loc. and Textual Note 24.
24. Reading al aer for MT aer al and omitting kn, kn being possibly a dittograph
of r of aer in the Old Heb. script.
25. Reading yiq with one Heb. MS for MT yaqi.
26. Reading yarienn for MT yaria, with omission of n by haplography before w.
27. Reading yeenn for MT yerenn assuming corruption of b to r in the Old Heb.
script and y to w in the script at the stage of development of the Qumran MSS.
28. Reading k el-elah mar for MT k-el-l hemar. See Commentary ad loc.
29. Reading ni for MT n. See Commentary ad loc.
30. Reading l for MT ebl. See Commentary ad loc.
31. a eezeh for MT bil eezeh, assuming haplography of bl after ebl.
32. Reading yeallemekk for MT yeallemenn, assuming corruption of k to n in the
Old Heb. script.
33. Reading meastw for MT mast.
34. Reading h for MT n, assuming corruption of h to w and to n in the Old Heb.
script.
35. The colon is possibly to be omitted as a gloss.
36. Omitting MT a as a dittograph under the inuence of iyy. See Commentary ad
loc.
37. Reading weyarbeh for MT weyere.
3. le introducing el (for MT el) is a case of nota accusativa, another of the
many Aramaisms in the Elihu passages.
4. The parallelism with ban (to assay) in the simile in vv. 3-4 indicates the
meaning of bar here, to test, as regularly in Aram. This is also implied in
the regular meaning of the verb in Heb. to choose; cf. Isa. 48.10, beartk
ber n (I have tested you in the furnace of afiction). mip here is
justice, what is right in the abstract, as the parallel mah- (what is
good) indicates. The lecturer touches on the particular case only to abstract
general principles.
5. Citing Jobs proposition that he is innocent (daqt) and that condence in
Gods justice is not justied (v. 9), Elihu goes on to argue for the efciency of
the theodicy.
l hsr mip (God has dismissed my case) cites Jobs words in 27.2.
6. For MT aazz LXX reads yeazz (he [i.e. God] makes me out a liar).
MT is a scribal adjustment (tiqqun serm) to avoid the association of God
with wrong. Duhm retains the consonants of MT, pointing ekkz (I am
accounted a liar). Ehrlichs emendation e (I suffer) is graphically
feasible, and would give an excellent parallel to n maa (sick of my
wound), for MT n i (sick of my arrow), as proposed by Duhm; cf.
Mic. 1.9, anh makkh (sick of her wounds) and Jer. 30.12.
1
The Book of Job
417
7. laa (mockery) refers to Jobs embarrassing citation of empiric facts to

upset conventional beliefs. In so doing he is said to have ranked himself with
evil-doers (pal wen) and wicked men (ane rea) (v. 8), who are
associated with scofng in the Psalms (e.g. Ps. 1.1; 32.7; 35.15, 19, 25; 69.13
[EVV 12]).
9. This verse, which Hlscher after Budde would excise as anticipating Elihus
argument after 35.3, where the same question is introduced and discussed
fully, is not out of place here, where it species wherein Job goes the way of
the wicked, and summarizes the proposition to be refuted. Verse 10, which
Budde also rejects as interrupting the argument, must also be retained as
introducing Elihus own argument after his citation of Job. On the verb san
(to care for, hence benet, prot), see on 15.3. rh here is better taken to
mean to full ones obligations, as in 14.6; cf. discharging the penalty for sin
(Isa. 40.2) and keeping the Sabbath-obligation (Lev. 26.34, 43; 2 Chron.
36.21).
10. Again the appeal of the lecturer to his general audience, ane l
(men of intelligence, lit. heart), and the general repudiation of the
imputation of injustice to God mark the sapiential method so characteristic of
Elihus speeches. If v. 10a was indeed a couplet certain words have dropped
out from the rst colon, which we may restore from 34.34: ln amm
haazn (Wherefore, ye wise men, give ear).
In v. 10b the metre demands an extra beat, hence with LXX we read
mawwl eeq (not to pervert the right). This suggests that mrea in v.
10b, though intelligible, might be better emended to mrea. adday
governed by llh, like l, should have the preposition le.
11. Here m has clearly the nuance of its Arab. cognate me (to arrive).
God causes a person to arrive, that is, brings him to the end of the path he has
chosen for himself.
13. On the reading arh (his earth) see Textual Note.
We understand lyw, al expressing liability after m in v. 13b, where it
would disrupt the metre. In the Ras Shamra texts the same preposition is often
omitted before a second noun in the parallel colon.
14. On the reading of v. 14a, im-y lyw ra, see Textual Note. After
the corruption of y to ym, libb was written alongside ra. The latter
word is superuous both to the rst and second cola if libb is preserved, and
it belongs to the rst colon as the natural parallel to nemh in the second, the
two being frequently parallel, expressing Gods animation of humanity (e.g.
32.8; 33.4). The sentiment of this couplet and the following recalls Ps.
104.29b, c:
1
418

ts rm yiwn
weel-arm yen
You withdraw their spirit and they expire,
And return to their dust.
15. It is often doubted whether r (dust) signies the grave, or underworld, as it often does, or simply ground. Here it probably refers to humanity
created from dust and returning to dust (Gen. 3.9). So S, his dust.
16. On the reading han see Textual Note.
17. a means generally in Classical Heb. to bind, or harness; cf. Arab.
abaa (to imprison). ar has the latter sense in Heb., and also means to
restrain in the sense of to govern (1 Sam. 9.17). a has evidently this
meaning in Isa. 3.7.
The primary connotation of mip and its verb a (to rule) is clear
from the Ras Shamra texts, where the participle p is found as the parallel of
mlk (king) (see, e.g., Gordon UT 49 VI, 29) and of zbl (prince) (see, e.g.
Gordon UT 68.15, 16-17, 22, 25). Judgment, which was an essential function
of the ancient king, was a secondary meaning.
On kabbr, here mighty, a divine epithet, see on 31.25.
18. The participle hmr (for MT haamr, see Textual Note) qualies God,
the antecedent of the relative particle in v. 19. There is an afnity here with the
participle with the denite article which introduces the exploits of God as king
in the Hymn of Praise.
19. The mention of rm (notables, see on 29.9) after kings and nobles
(nem) in v. 18 indicates that the subject of hmr and n pnm in v.
19 is the same.
nikkar is used in the Piel only here and in 21.29, the usual form being
Hiphil, and so is a linguistic peculiarity of Job. The meaning to show partiality, which is attested of the Niphal in Deut. 1.17; 16.19; Prov. 24.23; 28.21 is
also comparatively rarely attested.
On a, noble in rank and generous, see on 29.11.
29c. We adopt Ehrlichs suggestion that yaa is either a corruption of yaaz,
an apocopated form of zh, or a dialectic form reecting the phonetic shift
from z to d in Aram.
30. Verse 30b is short of a beat. If the passage is original and not a gloss we
may suggest that meaqqem (and who wronged them) has been omitted by
haplography after mimmqem. The assonance is characteristic of the style of
the writer of Job and his circle.
1
The Book of Job
419
20. The verb ga, here in the Pual (cf. Jer. 25.16; 46.8 in Hithpoel) is attested
besides only in Ps. 18.8 = 2 Sam. 22.8. The reading has been questioned here,
and various plausible emendations, all conjectural, have been proposed. For
MT yea m Budde proposed yea m (the nobles are shaken);
Hlscher yiwe sm, the nobles expire (so Mowinckel, Fohrer, Larcher);
Duhm yea mm (they are shaken out of the people), for which a better
translation might be they are shaken so that they are no longer a people; TurSinai suggested yna sm (he drives forth the nobles) or, more close to
MT, yigga m (he strikes the rich) (so Beer, Kissane, Stier, Lvque).
Dhormes interpretation of the deposition of a ruler by a popular rising is not
apt in the context, where the immediate agency of God (without a hand) is
emphasized. Pope reads MT, taking am as notables or gentry, like am
hre in 2 Kgs 21.24; 23.30, where they are politically signicant, over
against the feudal retainers of the king; cf. 2 Kgs 25.19, where, with the royal
family and retinue, sixty of them are deported; see also Jer. 25.2. The limited
number of these alone on this occasion indicates the status of the am hre,
whom Alt (1959: 237) has compared to ni mati (men of the land), local
notables deported with unsatisfactory rulers according to Assyrian imperial
inscriptions of the eighth century (Gilleschewski 1922: 137ff.; Galling 1929:
32; Gordis 1935: 242ff.; Wrthwein 1936). am were probably so called
because they represented the kinship units, also called am in Arab tribal
society, and the ancestor (Arab. am) from whom those groups claimed
descent. This may be the signicance of the term in 34.20. While we prefer
Buddes reading, we admit the feasibility of Popes interpretation.
MT weysr must be emended either to weysr, understanding God as
subject, or, with abbr as subject, weysr or, if abbr is taken as a collective
sing., weysr.
l bey is ambiguous. It may signify effortlessly (so Dhorme, Kissane)
or without human agency (G.B. Gray, Mowinckel, Fohrer, Terrien, and
apparently also Pope, to judge from his citation of Dan. 2.34 and 8.25). This is
the meaning which we adopt as best suiting the context, though the phrase of
itself is patient of the former interpretation and might even signify without
memorial; cf. y, the memorial set up by Absalom in Jerusalem to perpetuate his name (2 Sam. 18.18).
25. ln here has probably, as Dhorme suggests, a nuance of Arab. lkin
(but). This adversative conjunction would link the verse excellently with
v. 22, whereas in its present position it breaks the sense. See Introduction to
ch. 34.
mab is an Aram. form, the Classical Heb. being maaeh.
Our reading waham for MT weh is suggested by S.
weyiddakk (pausal form) is a case of the Hithpael with the assimilation
of t to the initial dental, as in 5.4.
1
420
23. On the reading k l al- m, this probably refers to Jobs claim for
an appointed hearing; cf. 14.13; 24.1, where ittm denotes appointed times for
a divine assize. denotes an individual as distinct from generic m.
26-27. The text is probably corrupt here, resulting in a short colon in v. 26b
and an overlong colon in v. 27a. The uncertainty is increased by the fact that
the ancient versions are not all complete at this point, and those which do
contain this passage, or part of it, show variant readings. Of these LXXA may
suggest the completion of v. 26b, they are seen in the presence of their
enemies, a reading which is supported by V. This may indicate the reading
bimeqm rm bhem (lit. in the place of those who look upon them). This
may be the idiom rh be (to see ones desire upon, e.g. Mic. 7.10; Ezek.
28.17; Obad. 12, 13; Pss. 22.18; 112.8; cf. the Mesha Inscription, l. 4). The
phrase means to gloat over. We take rh al as a variant of this idiom in
Job 34.26, which we read bimeqm rm alhem. We suggest that v. 27a
continued: al-aer sr maaryw (because they turned from following
him), MT kn having come in as a dittograph of the following s and r in the
Old Hebraic script. On this view alhem in our restoration of v. 26b probably
dropped out before al-aer, which it resembles in that script.
In v. 26a taat has its locative sense; cf. in the Ras Shamra texts, tt adrm
dbgrn (in the place of the notables who are in the public place). There may
be an allusion to the death of Jehoram in Naboths town Jezreel (2 Kgs 9.26f.).
After S we adopt Houbigants reading rim for MT rem.
saq is probably an orthographic variant of aq (to slap), that is, the
thigh in sorrow or remorse, or the hands in mockery (e.g. 27.23; Lam. 2.15),
hence here possibly, with the direct object, to strike, as in the Arab. cognate
afaqa.
28. The repetition of aaqa in two parallel cola is unusual, and Duhm
proposed iweat (the cry of) with the same meaning in the second place.
Here, however, it may be observed that dal and aniyym and not aaqa are
the items in parallelism. On the innitive construct followed asyndetically by
the imperfect expressing purpose with Ugaritic precedent, see on 33.17.
29. This verse, which is composed of two conditional sentences with the
protases introduced by the jussive without a conditional particle and the
apodosis rhetorical questions, animadverts on Jobs claim that the operation of
the theodicy was not immediate or evident. This anticipates Elihus later
statement of the transcendence of God. In v. 29b Budde proposed to emend MT
yerenn to yeyasserenn (who will upbraid him?), which is certainly a more
exact parallel to yaria in v. 29a. On the other hand MT yaria may be a
corruption of yar ([who can] move him?); cf. Isa. 14.16, where this verb is
parallel to raz (to trouble). The sentiment is that God cannot be compelled
at the will of a human to action in accordance with human expectation. If MT
1
The Book of Job
421
of v. 29b is correct, yerenn may indicate a reading yerenn ([who] will

oblige him to investigate?). For this possible sense of the verb, cf. Arab. ra,
yaru. But we prefer to emend to yeenn, assuming corruption of b to r in
the Old Heb. script and y to w at the stage of development as in the Qumran
MSS. We take weyastr as the reexive of sr (to turn away), either as an
Iphteal form, such as is attested in the Mesha Inscription and, with this verb,
regularly in the Ras Shamra texts, or the regular Hithpael of Classical Heb.
with the metathesis of t and the initial sibilant of the verb. This would support
the reading of the parallel yeenn.
31-33. This is a notorious crux, and the ancient versions do not give much
help, so that we must be guided by the general sense, taking into account
Elihus argument which he has already adduced and what is to follow. First, a
new word division in v. 31a gives the reading k-el-elah mar (if one were
to say to God, so S). For MT n most modern commentators read ni
(I was seduced); cf. Isa. 19.13. Dhorme proposed that MT ebl in v. 31b
means I shall sin, as the verb means in 21.7 and Neh. 1.7, and that it was
followed by (again). He treats bl of MT bila in v. 32a as a dittograph
of the last two letters of the preceding word ebl, continuing a eezeh
atth hrn (that I may see do thou instruct me). Dhorme accepts MT in the
sequel, but assumes a lacuna after mast in v. 33a (so Hlscher). Fohrer and
Pope take the text here as complete, which is supported by the natural
parallelism k meastw (for MT mast) and k-atth tiar, especially if the
latter verb is taken in the sense of choose. Dhorme and Hlscher take the
verb as meaning to examine, assess, a sense which it certainly has in Aram.
and in the Elihu passages (e.g. 34.4).
Popes emendation of MT n to h is not so drastic as it seems at rst
sight, if it is assumed that the corruption took place in the Old Hebraic script.
Verse 33c is either an incomplete couplet or, as Fohrer proposes, a gloss,
which we consider more probable. In v. 31b, which we take as part of the
argument imputed to an imaginary sinner, which ends at v. 32, we suggest the
pointing of MT ebl as l (I shall [not] be liable). This is the most
common meaning of the verb in Classical Heb., in the Qal to take a pledge
and in the Niphal to bind oneself by a pledge, that is, to admit liability. Here,
the sinner is palliating his sin, alleging that he has been seduced (ni) and
is therefore not liable (v. 31b); as a simpleton he is in need of instruction (v.
32a), after which he undertakes to sin no more (32b). Elihus indignant
question to the imaginary sinner questions if when a person has rejected God
(meastw, v. 33a) and chosen his own course (tibar, v. 33b), he can expect
God to requite him on his own terms (MT hamimme yeallemennh), which
may mean rather at your own initiative and, it is implied in the argument, on
your own terms. We might further propose that in the verb yeallemennh,
which we take as the energic form, the original may possibly have been
yeallemekkh in scriptio plena with the corruption of k to n in the Old Hebraic
script.
1
422
Fohrers suggestion should be noted, namely that v. 31 read originally

haymar l l (so Duhm, Beer), continuing with Gods confession that he
was wrong. According to this view MT represents the adjustment of the texts
by orthodox scribes (tiqqn serm) through motives of reverence. The view,
in our opinion, is interesting, but gratuitous.
36. has been connected with the precative particle b (Please!), which is
derived from h, cognate with Arab. aba(y) (to consent, be willing; see
Honeyman 1944: 81ff.). Dhorme proposed to emend to al (but) after LXX,
but the metre demands that it be omitted, having originally come into the text
through a scribal inadvertency through the inuence of iyy in the same
colon.
Jobs general position has already been condemned (v. 35); Elihu now
proposes to deal with his arguments in detail to the end or possibly
thoroughly, a-nea (Thomas 1956: 106).
al-teu means in the matter of, or for answers (given).
beane-wen means, if correct, in the category of men of iniquity, which
is tantamount to like. Though be, as the beth essentiae, is grammatically
possible, it may be a scribal error for ke, in the last stage of the development of
the script.
37. We follow Dhormes arrangement of the text here into a nal tricolon:
k ys al-a
pea bnn yispq
weyarbeh amryw ll.
Dhorme takes saq in its Aram. sense to doubt, that is, refuse to admit,
which may possibly be pointed as the Hiphil as Dhorme proposes, meaning
cast doubts upon.
Job 35.1; 33.31-33; 35.236.25

ELIHUS THIRD ADDRESS
In nine strophes (33.31-33 + 35.2-3; 35.4-8; 9-14; 35.1536.4; 36.5-7a; 7b-10;
11-15; 16-21; 22-25) the sage continues to cite signicant propositions in
Jobs argument (e.g. 35.2, 3, 14-15), and to demolish them and develop his
antithesis in support of his belief in the theodicy. The address opens with the
usual call to hear and answer (33.31-33; 35.2-3), continues in the style, not so
such of sapiential discourse, but rather of a controversial lecture like most of
the Elihu speeches, and culminates in the citation of a hymn of praise (36.2225) to clinch the argument for the divine economy.
The rst strophe (33.31-33 + 35.2-3) culminates in the citation of Jobs
assertion of his claim on God (35.2b-3). Here Job seems to be accused of
inconsistency, of asserting in the one breath his claim on God in virtue of his
alleged innocence (35.2b) and of declaring in the other that on the basis of his
afiction his good or bad conduct has no bearing on what he may expect from
God (v. 3). In reply in the second strophe (35.4-8) Elihu states that, as nature
itself indicates, God is transcendent, beyond the effects of good or bad conduct
of humans, which affects only society or the individual. In the third strophe
(35.9-14) Elihu develops the theme of the sufferings of the oppressed who cry
out and are apparently unanswered. He lays the responsibility for such
afictions on society and not on God as Job had maintained. People cannot cry
inarticulately to God and expect immediate relief; they must rather look to him
to give them fortitude, hope and faith in his purpose, which is beyond the
immediate perception and reaction of the brutes. In the fourth strophe (35.15
36.4) Elihu cites Jobs objection that social injustice seems to contradict the
theodicy (35.15-16), and he prepares to contradict it and clear God of the
charge of injustice (36.3). In the fth strophe (36.5-7a) he asserts the validity
of the theodicy. In the sixth strophe (36.7b-10) he appeals to the facts of
history, kings raised by the grace of God and their fall, possibly animadverting
on the experience of Manasseh of Judah (2 Chron. 33.10-13). This is Gods
opportunity to convince them of their sin. The seventh strophe (36.11-15)
develops the theme of contrition in suffering as anticipating restoration to
blessing (36.11); obduracy is fatal (36.13-14) but afiction may be a salutary
discipline. In the eighth strophe (36.16-21), it is objected to Job that his longaccustomed prosperity and exemption from the divine discipline of afiction
has moved him to question Gods economy. The last strophe (36.22-25)
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424
Job 35.1; 33.31-33; 35.236.25. Elihus Third Address
asserts the orthodox belief in the theodicy, which suggests the fuller citation of
a Hymn of Praise on the Sovereignty and Providence of God in the following
section (36.2737.13).
On the inclusion of 33.31-33 as the introduction to 35.2ff., see the
Introduction to ch. 33. Job 36.1 is probably secondary and redactional. The
text is probably defective in 36.16, and 36.19-20 are either defective or a
secondary addition to the original.
Chapters 35.1; 33.31-33; 35.236.25
35.1.
And Elihu spoke up and said:
33.31.
Pay heed, Job, hearken to me,

Keep silence that I may speak.
If you have anything to say answer me,
Speak, for I desire to clear you.
But if not, listen to me,
Keep silence, and I will teach you wisdom.
Do you consider this right?
Do you say, It is my right from God?
That you say, What good does it do you?
What the better am I that I have not sinned?
32.
33.
35.2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15
I will give you an answer,

And your three1 friends along with you.
Look at the heavens and see,
And observe the clouds which are higher than you.
If you sin, how will you affect him,
And if your sins are numerous, what do you do to him?
If you are righteous, what do you give him?
Or what does he receive from your hand?
It is a man like yourself that your sin affects,
And a son of man your righteousness.
Because of many oppressive acts people cry out2
They call (for help) from the arm of the great ones.
But they do not say,3 Where is God our Maker,4
Who gives courage in the night,
Who imparts to us more knowledge than the beasts,
And more wisdom than the birds of the sky?
Then they cry, but he does not answer
Simply because of the shouting5 of the wicked.
But vain is the statement, God does not hear,
Nor does the Almighty pay any regard!
Even though you do say, He does not regard me!,6
Be still7 before Him and wait patiently8 for him.
But now, because for all his anger he makes no visitation,9
And for all his might10 he is indifferent to transgression,11
The Book of Job

16.
36.1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
Job opens his mouth in vain talk,

And talks insolently without knowledge.
12
Wait for a little that I may show you,
For I have yet something to say for God.
I will bring knowledge from afar,
And will justify my Creator.
For truly my words are no falsehood;
You have to contend with one who is perfect in knowledge.
See, God is great in might,13
He does not reject the pure14 of heart;
He does not let the wicked thrive,
But admits the just case of the poor sufferer,
He does not withdraw his eyes from the innocent one.
He has set15 kings on the throne
And lets them be enthroned in splendour, and they are exalted;
And if they are bound with fetters,
Held fast in bonds of afiction,
He declares16 to them what they have done,
How they have sinned deantly in their tyranny,
And he lets them clearly hear17 reproof,
And orders18 them to turn back from evil.
If they listen to him, so as to serve him,
They live out their days in prosperity,
And their years pleasantly;
But if they do not listen they pass away,19
And perish without taking notice,
But the impious nurse20 wrath;
They do not cry to him when he has arrested them.
So their personality perishes in their prime,
Their vitality spent like sacral catamites.
He delivers the sufferer through his suffering,
And makes afiction a means of revelation.
But21 superabundance22 has moved you,
Plenty and no pinch where you are placed,23
And your table-top full of fatness,
And you are full of the food of the guilty
While they manipulate a case at law.
But beware24 lest one entice you with satiety
And a large bribe warp your judgment.
Will all your wealth be comparable25 to what you have lost,26
Or all the power you have accumulated?
You need not long for the night
For worries to be dislodged.27
Take care not to turn to mischief,
Seeing that is why you have preferred exultation28 to afiction.
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426
22.
23.
24.
25.

See, God is exalted in his might.
Who is a ruler29 like him?
Who has prescribed his government for him?
Who has said, You have done wrong?
Remember to exalt his works,
All humanity faces him from a distance,
Mere mortals look upon him from afar.
Textual Notes to Chapters 35.1;

33.31-33; 35.236.25
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
Reading ele with LXX for MT e.

Reading yizaq (pausal) for MT yzq.
Reading mer for MT mar in agreement with v. 11.
Reading n for MT y in agreement with v. 11.
On the meaning shouting, suggested by the parallelism, instead of arrogance
(gn), and the possible corruption in MT of a cognate of Ugaritic (voice), see
Commentary ad loc.
Reading terenn, a quotation of Jobs words.
Reading dm for MT dn, as in Ps. 37.7, but for a possible defence of MT dn see
Commentary ad loc.
Reading wehl, from yal, for MT ell.
Reading pq for MT pqa after Theod. and Sym.
Reading me, including w from the following word. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading beea with Theod., Sym and LXX for bappa.
Omitting 36.1 as a gloss.
Assuming displacement of ka from v. 5b.
Reading ber, assuming dittography of k after m in Old Heb. script and metathesis
of y and r in MT kabbr.
Conjecturing for MT e.
Reading weyagg for MT wayyagg.
Reading weymar for MT wayymer.
Reading weyileh for MT wayyiel.
Omitting beela metri causa as a gloss after 33.18.
Conjecturing yimer for MT ym.
Conjecturing a for MT wea.
Conjecturing mipr for MT mipp-r. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading tat for MT tath.
Reading emh for MT mh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yr for MT yaar.
Reading leore. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading mittatm, assuming haplography of prepositional m after m of preceding
word. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading alzh for MT al-zeh.
Reading mr for MT mreh, after LXX.
The Book of Job
427
Commentary on 35.1; 33.31-33; 35.236.25

33.33. Nothing could differentiate the Elihu passages from the Dialogue of the
Book of Job more clearly than the statement aallee omh (I shall teach
you wisdom), and his summons to the sages in 34.2ff. The verb la (to
learn) with the causative intensive to teach is peculiar to Wisdom literature
in the OT, where it is comparatively rare (e.g. Prov. 22.25; Job. 33.33; 35.11).
35.3. If san means to prot here as in 15.3, where, as here, it is parallel
to hl, it might seem as if MT le might be emended to l (so Graetz, Duhm,
Beer, Budde, Hlscher, Mowinckel, Fohrer, AV, RV, NEB). In the light of
Elihus direct reply to this quotation of Job, however, we consider that le, sc.
God, should be retained. In consideration of v. 7 too we take min in ma
as privative, meaning my sinlessless. Retaining l in v. 3b, we take the
couplet to mean that Job questions if his sinlessness is any advantage to God
or to himself. The connection of this couplet with Elihus reply in v. 7 also
rules out Tur-Sinais suggestion that ma means because of my
appeasement, a sense of the verb (Piel and Hithpael) which he adduces from
the Talmud and Midrash Rabbah.
4. We assume the omission of ele by homoeoteleuton after e- in v. 4b.
5. geh is the verb in the relative clause, the relative particle being omitted
as often in poetry.
6. Verse 6b is a conditional sentence with the perfect verb as the protasis, the
conditional particle in the protasis in v. 6b doing double duty. For MT b S and
V read l, but b may be retained, the preposition denoting hostility; cf. pen
yhwh bes r Ps. 34.16 [EVV 17]).
9. The Qal must be read for the Hiphil of the verb in v. 9a.
kabbrm (the mighty) is proposed for MT rabbm, but this is not
necessary, since ra is used as a synonym of m (powerful) in Isa. 53.12.
10. In v. 10a S reads the plural mer and n, which is suggested by the
plural in the following verse, and is graphically feasible.
In v. 10b songs (zemir) in the night is unparalleled in the OT and has
been accepted too readily perhaps because of the recollection of the praises of
Paul and Silas in the prison of Philippi (Acts 16.25). Noting the collocation of
nan with ql in the sense of thunder, Dhorme so interprets the passage, but
there seems no particular reason why thunder by night should be more impressive than during the day, and description of thunder as songs is doubtful.
428
Various emendations have been suggested, for example, emr, watches

(Bickell), mer, lights (Ehrlich), mazzr, the Hyades (Wright; cf.
38.32), which is graphically the most feasible of these suggestions. The matter
is complicated by the uncertainty as to whether night is used in a literal or a
gurative sense. If the former, our preference is for Wrights suggestion, the
allusion being to Gods provision of the vital rain while the peasant slept. But
in the context night may rather signify a season of ordeal and doubt, as for
instance in Ps. 46.6: God shall answer us as it turns to morning. We would
regard zemir, the feminine plural, as an abstract noun, might, courage (so
Tur-Sinai, Pope; cf. Kissane, succour, Habel , protection), from a root zmr,
recognized by Tur-Sinai in Exod. 15.2; Isa. 12.2; Ps. 118.14 in the statement
ozz wezimer (MT zimer) yh (Yahweh is my strength and might; cf.
zemr arm yeanneh (MT yaaneh), he humbles the might of tyrants, Isa.
25.5). This, Pope suggests, may be the signicance of the name Zimri. It may
thus be cognate with Arab. amara (to be violent, mighty, courageous; cf.
dmrn, which U. Cassuto (h-lh anat, 1951: 46) recognized as a title of
Baal in the Ugaritic text Gordon, UT 51 VII, 38-39.
11. The preposition min in v. 11a is ambiguous. It has generally been taken as
comparative. If this is so Elihu is implying that afiction should not result
merely in a howl of pain as in the case of animals when they are hurt, but that
humans should reason from effect to cause (cf. Amos 3.4-5, 6cd). This is just
what the friends of Job had urged, that he accept his afiction as meaningful as
coming from God who had regulated the natural and moral order, and address
himself to God in penitence and patience. Those who take min as from the
beasts (so Dhorme, Pope) regard the animals and their regular habits as
evidences of Gods order in nature, which is part of the argument in the divine
speech (chs. 3841).
The elision of in mallen (meallen) may be owing to a scribal
inadvertency. Guillaume takes it to indicate the origin of the Book of Job and
the Elihu addendum in the Hejaz, where, though at a much later date, C. Rabin
(1951: 131ff.) notes the elision of initial as a dialectic peculiarity.
12. We nd in m the same force as in Arab. umma, indicating the next stage
in the narrative or argument; cf. Ps. 66.6 (see on 23.7). This seems a more
probable explanation than that of Dahood (1957: 307), that this is Akk. umma
(if). Such a solitary survival in a late book is surely most unlikely.
This verse evidently resumes the thought of v. 9, and is to be understood as
very pregnant, meaning that God does not hear mere animal cries of distress
(v. 12a), nor is he, rather than the arrogance of the wicked, responsible for the
sufferings which prompt the cries. Such a pregnant couplet, however, where v.
12b reads almost like a gloss, is still awkward, and as an alternative we might
suggest that MT gen is a form, or a corruption, of , known in the Ras
Shamra texts as a loud voice; cf. gm y (he cried aloud). The meaning
1
The Book of Job
429
would then be Simply because of the shouting of wicked men This might
suggest that g and gen in Isa. 16.6, where the nouns are the objects of
ma (to hear), may mean shouting; cf. Jer. 48.29.
13. If T is accepted there are various interpretations: God does not listen to
frivolity (so Renan; cf. Le Hir, G.B. Gray, Kissane, Pope, Terrien, after LXX);
It is in vain; God does not hear it (Dhorme, Hlscher, Mowinckel, Fohrer).
Connecting the verse with v. 14, we follow Ehrlichs interpretation, and take
God does not hear as a quotation of Jobs allegation, which is dismissed as
vain (w).
The ending of yerennh has occasioned difculty, the ending being taken
as the 3rd fem. sing. pronom. sufx. Those who take w as the object of the
verb (proleptic) emend to yerenn (so Budde, Oort, Duhm). We would retain
MT as an example of the energic ending of the imperfect as in Ugaritic.
14. a k in the sense of how much less? is already used in the dialectic of
Job in 9.14 and 25.6, but it might have a concessive force, anticipating the
exhortation to hope in Job.
In a passage which contains so many of Jobs statements it is natural to
expect Jobs direct speech in v. 14 and, we suggest in v. 15, which indicates
the emendation of MT terenn (you see him) to terenn or yerenn,
though this is a pure conjecture unsupported by the ancient versions. MT in
v. 14b is generally taken to mean The case (dn) is before him, so wait for
him (so Dhorme and most modern commentators). Perles, citing Ps. 37.7,
suggested the reading dom lenyw hl l (Be still before and wait for
him; so Hlscher, cf. Kissane). Alternatively MT dn may be the cognate of
Arab. dna, yadn (to submit) as Jacob suggested (1912: 191; accepted by
Guillaume 1968).
15-16. Having thus argued his case against a hypothetical interlocutor, to
whom he has attributed Jobs statements, Elihu now states the case more
generally, but still with the citation of Jobs sentiments in v. 15. Here we
accept MT in the main, literally rendered:
But now because his anger makes no visitation
And his might takes no note of transgression,
(see textual note) which we may paraphrase:

But now, because for all his anger he makes no visitation,
And for all his might he is indifferent to transgression.
For ap as subject cf. Job 16.9 and for me as a noun cf. Deut. 6.5 beolSee further textual note ad loc.
mee.
16. yabr may mean to make big or to make numerous according to the
meaning of kabbr noted above (see on 34.17). We take the verb here with the
1
430
meaning of the Arab. cognate in the Vth Form of the verb, to behave
insolently.
36.2. kattr in Aram. and Syr. means regularly wait.
aawwh (let me declare) is also an Aramaism, used frequently in the
Elihu passages; cf. 32.6, 10, 17.
zer (a little) is found probably in a quantitative sense in Isa. 28.10, 13,
but here of time; cf. mea mizr (Yet a little while) in Isa. 10.25; 29.17.
In v. 2b LXX in me has suggested that MT leelah is to be emended to
leelh (Hoffman) or even to l with leelh as a gloss (so Duhm). Accepting
MT Hlscher takes le in leelah as concerning God, but for God is more
likely (so Dhorme and most modern commentators); cf. 13.7. This is supported by v. 3b (I will justify my Creator).
3. Again da is used in the Elihu passages (cf. 32.6, 10, 17) for the more
common daa.
le in lemrq is now explicable in the light of Ugaritic, where le means
from, as reinforcing min. Perhaps in Heb., which, unlike Ugaritic, had the
preposition min, min was inserted into the expression lerq to obviate the
ambiguity of le in Classical Heb.
4. im has here the adversative sense, as with certain verbs in Classical Heb.,
for example, nilam, r, nipa, neeaq (to wrestle), as regularly in
Ugaritic, where it also denotes motion towards.
5. On the reading, supported by S, and rst suggested by Nichols (191011:
162), who read the sing. bar (so Dhorme, Pope) see Textual Note.
7. dn (just case) has been suggested for MT nyw (his eyes); so Bickell,
Budde, Beer, Peake, Dhorme, Stevenson, Larcher. But in view of the regular
mention of the eyes of God upon the just (e.g. Ps. 33.18; Prov. 22.12), there is
no reason to doubt MT. In v. 7c lnea is ambiguous. Usually it means for
ever, but it also means splendour, for instance, God as the Splendour
(nea) of Israel (1 Sam. 15.29). Either sense is possible here. If the former, it
might be an ironical reference to a coronation formula; cf. Ps. 89.5, 29, 37
(EVV 4, 28, 36), where the formula is a-lm or lelm, but we prefer the
latter.
9. pea signies deliberate sin in deance of authority either human or divine.
For the verb in v. 9b, a denominative verb from gibbr, cf. Arab. jabbr
(bully, tyrant).
10. Literally Opens their ear in reproof, almost literally recalling Elihus
statement in 33.1.
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The Book of Job
431
11. a, meaning to do, till, serve, worship in Heb. means here probably
serve (God); cf. J.E. MacFadyens felicitous reading do him homage. The
reference is usually taken to be to the tradition of the detention of Manasseh in
Assyria and of his later release by the grace of God upon his repentance. In
spite of the unqualied condemnation of Manasseh by the Deuteronomistic
historian in Kings, a legend developed of his restoration, probably associated
with Esarhaddons invasion of Egypt (A.L. Oppenheim, ANET, 291), after his
contrition, which was established by the time of the Chronicler (2 Chron.
33.11-13) in the second half of the fourth century BCE. If, as seems likely, Job
36.7ff. refers to this tradition, it would suggest a period considerably later than
the completion of the Deuteronomistic History, in its nal recension about the
middle of the sixth century BCE.
12. Colon a seems overloaded, and possibly beela, in the stream (of death)
should be omitted before yaabr, repeated from 33.18. bel aa is ambiguous. It may mean that no one takes any notice or cares, the passing away of the
subject without any memory, or, as we prefer in the context, without themselves paying heed to what their conduct involves (NEB their lesson
unlearned).
13. ana-l is found in the Ras Shamra Legend of Aqht in the promise of El
that the miscreant (np lb) who has offended the goddess Anat should be
trampled down (Gordon UT 3 Aqht rev., 17). On n, see on 8.13. MT
ym has been a notorious difculty. Thus Lvque proposes ym
(breathe forth wrath). The verb may be cognate with Arab. ma, yamu
(to hide, so Guillaume 1964b: 33). The usual phonetic correspondence is
between Heb. s and Arab. or , but this is not invariable, as, for example,
with Heb. eme, Arab. amu, Heb. i, Arab, ba (to blaze up). MT
ym would mean assume the appearance of anger, perhaps scowl,
but we have preferred Dhormes suggestion to read yimer , assuming
omission of r before w by haplography in the Old Heb. script; cf. Amos 1.12.
14. nee is the whole person, animated body, what makes a person a whole
individual as God intended (Gen. 2.7). ayyh is here not life per se, as
distinct from ayym, but vitality; cf. Isa. 57.10, vigour (Exod. 1.19). In
baqqem, b signies in the category of. qem means those with a sacral
function, specically sacral prostitutes; cf. the fertility goddess Qodsu and
Assyrian qaditu (sacral prostitute). Such persons, both male and female,
were known in Israel (Deut. 23.18; 1 Kgs 14.24). The reference is evidently to
the castration of such males (Deut. 23.1), as understood by LXX titrskomenoi
(wounded, impaired). The reference may be either to their early failing health
or death through abuse or their inability to perpetuate themselves through
posterity, a pointed reference to the total extinction of the wicked.
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432
15. As against most commentators Fohrer translates yeall n beony as

He delivers the unfortunate from his misery, which might be supported by the
sense of the preposition be from, well attested in Ugaritic and Heb. poetry.
But, as the parallel colon indicates, the reference is to the disciplinary effect of
suffering. Here the writer of the Elihu passages shares the view of Ben Sira
(2.4-5). The word-play between yeall (he delivers) and laa (tribulation) is characteristic of Wisdom literature.
16. This passage, where MT is well attested in the ancient versions, is a
notorious crux. The odd colon 16a poses a problem for the text and interpretation. If v. 16a is the rst member of a decient bicolon there is nothing to
indicate certainly the actual meaning. If it is the last colon of a tricolon with v.
15ab, 16a might be read we has mipp-r, and he has even withdrawn
him from the enemy (so Duhm, citing 2 Chron. 18.31, wayyesm elhm
mimmenn, viz. Jehoshaphat in the battle of Ramoth). In view of the usual
sense of hs, to incite to good (Judg. 1.14) or evil (2 Sam. 28.19; Jer. 43.2
etc.) in the same strophe at v. 18, however, we question this reading and interpretation. We take v. 16a as the rst colon of a tricolon with v. 16bc, which,
with what immediately follows, refers to the temptation of afuence, and the
entertainment of rich miscreants to one in authority to pervert justice. This
suggests to us the reading a hase mir (but prosperity has moved
you) for MT a hase mipp-r; cf. pra (to abound) in Gen. 30.43;
Exod. 1.12; Isa. 54.3; Hos. 4.10; Job 1.10. In v. 16c we would retain naa as a
construct before ulnek, meaning a level place, here a level board; cf.
Arab. na, yanu (to level) and in the Baal myth from Ras Shamra, where
as associated with throne it might mean dais. Gordon UT nt IV, 46f.:
gr lksi mlkh
lnt lkt drkth
Who would drive him from his royal throne,
From the dais, the seat of his sovereignty.
17. r in the context may mean rich, cognate with Arab. ra (Guillaume
1963: 116) or guilt. In view of the sequel referring to bribery to divest justice
(v. 18), we prefer the latter sense, but there may be a double entendre. The
noun dn, formally repeated in v. 17a and b, if a synonym, is a solecism which
the writer would never have perpetrated. Tur-Sinai therefore divided the
consonants of MT to read:
wen resm l tn
mipa ym kw-(?)
And you do not judge the case of the wicked
And the justice of the orphan (?).
The Book of Job
433
Pope follows this reading, suggesting izzat as the fragmentary last word.
This, however, interrupts the reference to fat living in vv. 16 and 18. din,
which we translate as food in v. 17a, is unknown in this sense in Heb., though
mzn from the root zn is attested with this meaning in Gen. 45.23 and
2 Chron. 11.23 and in Biblical Aramaic in Dan. 4.9, 18. We suggest that the
writer availed himself of the known phonetic variation z/d; cf. Heb. zea/Syr.
dba, Heb. z/Syr. db, Heb. ze/Syr. db, to secure a word-play with dn
(judgment) in v. 17b. The verb tma (to grasp, hold, handle), may here
have the nuance manipulate.
18. In the context of bribery through lavish entertainment there seems no point
in a reference to wrath (MT mh) and mockery, lit. handclapping (seq;
so Fohrer), though there is more to be said for NEB lavish gifts of wine. We
nd the emendation of MT mh to Aram. emh (beware) more attractive,
with seeq meaning satiety as in Syr. (so Dhorme, Kissane, Pope).
19. ka is ambiguous, perhaps deliberately so. It means generally power,
the phrase maama ka recalling yeamm ka in Amos 2.14, but also
wealth (6.23; Prov. 5.10). a refers to ones noble standing or prestige; cf.
a parallel to n in Isa. 11.32 and to rm in Job 34.19, but it may also
refer here to the lavish entertainment by which the subject is bribed. The word
is a form of ya in the sense of generosity, either social or material. Both
senses are possible here, but the physical sense of the Arab. cognate waia
(to be wide), with a verbal noun aatu(n) (wealth, amplitude of life),
indicates that a here means wealth or amplitude of life which the illgotten wealth of the subject facilitates. This might best suit the following
beor, for which we read bore (what you have lost, lit. what you have had
cut away; cf. 42.2, l-yibbr mimme mezimmh). The verb ra (to
draw up, arrange) is used of comparison.
20. MT al-tia hallyelh laal ammm tatm (Do not long for the night
for peoples to go up from their places) has been the despair of commentators.
Duhm proposed the emendation al-taa hll ll im miakkn
(Do not let folly deceive you into raising yourself up with those who aspire to
wisdom). Kissane proposed al-tia hall le laal amme tatm
(Do not trample on [cf. Amos 8.4] that do not belong to you so that your
own kinsmen will be raised up in their place). Either of these is graphically
feasible, but rather abrupt in the context. Others translate v. 20b literally (e.g.
NEB, Habel; cf. Fohrer, who omits it as unheilbar verderbt, corrupt beyond
repair). Tur-Sinai renders v. 20b to emerge from under them (reading
mittatm) in the dark, taking am as cognate with Arab. amma (to be
overcast). We would agree with Tur-Sinai in reading mittatm, but in the
sense from their place, sc. from where they have settled, but take ammm
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434
as cognate with Arab. ammu(n) (grief, worry), rendering You need not
long for the night for worries to be dislodged. Night brings no relief from the
complications of a wicked life just described or from a bad conscience.
21. Taking bar in the sense of Syriac bar (to test; cf. Isa. 48.10), Wright
rendered this is why you have been tried by afiction (so also Dhorme, and
NEB), which would necessitate reading Pual for Qal of MT. This, to be sure,
would accord with Elihus view of the therapeutic value of suffering, but in
the context of the strophe vv. 18-21 we take MT bart in the sense it usually
has in the OT, to choose, which is supported by the comparative m in mn.
al-zeh has been emended to awelh, which is graphically feasible in the
square script, rendering Because you have preferred wickedness to humility
or afiction (so Fohrer), but in the context of high living to corrupt a poor
man we prefer to emend MT al-zeh to alzh (exultation), a variant on the
regular alh; cf. zaq/aq.
22. Elihu prepares to end his statement with a Hymn of Praise, vv. 26ff., to
which vv. 22-25 serves as a prelude, as well as a conclusion to 36.2-25. Gods
exultation in power (v. 22a) supported the reading mr (lord, ruler), an
Aram. word, in the parallel colon.
23. In the context of the sovereignty of God, government seems a more apt
translation than way for dere; cf. drk parallel to mlk (royal rule) in the Ras
Shamra texts.
24. Remember to exalt his works of which men have sung reects the Plaint
of the Sufferer, who, after having voiced his plaint and experienced the assurance of relief, gives public testimony, often expressed in the Hymn of Praise to
the sovereignty and providence of God (e.g. Pss. 34; 35; 57.7ff.). There is no
doubt that rer means have sung, Polel of r with a transitive sense, as in
Zeph. 2.14; 1 Chronicles 6; 2 Chron. 29.28; cf. m from m (Judg. 9.54; 1
Sam. 17.51; 2 Sam. 1.10; Jer. 20.17; Ps. 34.22).
25. In rendering z stand back from NEB evidently understood the verb as
cognate with Arab. (to be opposite); cf. Exod. 29.26ff.; Lev. 8.29;
Num. 6.20, maazeh, the breast of a sacricial animal, Aram. and Syr.
ady. The verb may have this sense in Job 19.26. The rendering in NEB
seems to understand mrq in v. 25b as qualifying z in colon a as well as
yabb in colon b, which is possible. In any case, the verb admirably expresses
the compulsive attraction of mortals to God the Wholly Other.
Job 36.2637.13
ELIHUS CITATION OF A HYMN OF PRAISE
Gods impressive works in nature are adduced as evidence of his unsearchable
greatness and wisdom, but also of his providential care. The thunder and
accompanying rain is such a token. This was traditionally the token of the
kingly power of Baal triumphant, the power of providence in nature in ancient
Canaanite religion, liturgies of which on the same theme were adapted in
Israel as hymns of praise to Yahweh on his epiphany as King in the New Year
festival (Kapelrud 1940: 38-58; J. Gray 1956; 1961). The ideology of the
triumph of Cosmos over Chaos is evoked by the hymn, which thus rounds out
Elihus argument for the theodicy.
The hymn may be arranged in 10 short strophes as follows: 36.26-28, 31;
29-30; 36.3237.1; 37.2-3, 4, 5-6, 7-8, 9-10, 11-12c, 12d-13.
Here signicantly the sage directs us for the ultimate understanding of life
beyond the analysis of reason to the deeper experience of the joy of living and
the wonder of the creation from which so much joy is to be derived by all but
those who are wilfully obsessed by their own private problems. The ultimate
truths are beyond cold reason, and are captured by the intuition and sympathy
of the poet and those whom he may stimulate when the philosopher has failed.
In this the author of the Elihu speeches emphasizes what the Divine Address
signies in adducing the wonders of creation beyond the comprehension or
immediate convenience of humanity, not indeed to tease them with his
omnipotence, but to lift them beyond the narrow sphere of their experience
and vexation into the wonder and beauty of the larger sphere where the many
tokens of the power, wisdom and love of God disclose innite possibilities for
humans, who are still near to God even in the depth of their suffering.
Chapters 36.2637.13
36.26.
27.
28.
31.
1
Lo, God is great beyond our knowledge,

The number of his years is unsearchable.1
For he scoops up drops from the sea,2
Distils them3 as rain for the abyss,
With which the clouds pour,
Dropping showers on the earth.
Yea, by these he feeds the peoples;
He gives food in abundance.
436
29.
30.
32.
33.
37.1.
2.
3.
Job 36.2637.13. Elihus Citation

Can anyone understand how the clouds are spread out,
The crashing from his tabernacle?
Behold, the Most High4 spreads out his light,
And covers the tops of the mountains.5
In his hands the lightning ashes,6
He discharges it7 to a certain target.8
Thunder announces his coming,9
Showing zealous wrath against iniquity.10
At this moreover my heart trembles
And starts out of its place.
Hear, O hear, the turmoil of his thunder,
And the rumbling that comes forth from his mouth.
Under the whole sky is his ashing;11
And his light to the edges of the earth,
4.
In the wake of it his voice roars,

He thunders with his majestic voice;
And he does not restrain the water,12
As peal upon peal is heard.13
5.
God does14 wondrous things,

He does great things beyond our ken,15
For he commands the snow, Fall to the earth!,16
And the downpour and the rain,17 Be strong!18
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
He seals up all human activity,

That every man may leave off his work,
And the wild beasts go to their lair,
And stay in their dens.
From the Chamber comes the whirlwind,
And from the Scatterers the cold.
By the breath of God ice is made,19
And the expanse of water is made solid.
12.
Moreover, his bright (sun)20 thrusts away the thick cloud,

Its light dispels the great cloud;
And it goes its course21 in its circuits,
Turning at his guidance,
To do all the work22 He commands it.23
13.
On the face of the whole world,

Whether for chastisement or for favour,24
Or in token of steadfast grace, he makes it light on one.
11.
Textual Notes to Chapters 36.2637.13

1.
2.
3.
4.
1
Reading l-qer for MT wel-qer, w being a dittograph after the preceding word.
Reading nem miyym for MT nie-myim.
Reading yezuqqm for MT yzqq, m being corrupted to w in the Old Heb. script.
Reading elyn for MT lyw.
The Book of Job

5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
437
Reading wer hrm for MT weore hayym.

Reading nsesh for MT kissh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading weyaqleh for MT wayeaw lh, q being corrupted to in the Old Heb.
script.
Reading bemiga for MT bemaga.
Reading ely for lyw.
Reading meqann a al-awlh for MT miqneh a al-lh. See Commentary ad
loc.
Reading erh for MT yirh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yeaqq mayim for MT yeaqqem. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading mipp for MT k. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yial for MT yarm, and omitting beql metri causa.
Reading perhaps l, omitting we in a relative clause, for MT wel.
Reading hewh for MT hew.
Reading welaggeem mr for weeem mr and omitting weeem mier as a
dittograph.
Reading uzz for MT uzz.
Reading yuttan with Sym., S and T for MT yitten. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading br for MT ber. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yihall, lost by haplography before mihapp.
Reading lil for MT leoolm, m being a dittograph before k of the following kl
in the Old Heb. script.
Reading yeawwh for MT yeawwm. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading ar for MT ar. See Commentary ad loc.
Commentary to Chapters 36.2637.13

36.26. On the signicance of the Hymn of Praise in relation to the liturgy of
the New Year festival and the theme of the Kingship of God, see the General
Introduction (pp. 49-50). As related to this theme the Hymn of Praise with its
reminiscences of this great occasion in the religious year of Israel ttingly
rounds out the argument of orthodoxy.
27. gra has already occurred in v. 7, meaning to withdraw; here it means
to withdraw something to oneself, to scoop up, and in 15.8 to monopolize.
For nie-myim (drops of water), nem miyym (drops from the sea)
should almost certainly be read, though that is conjectural.
In v. 27b zqaq is a transitive verb (to purify), used of gold in 28.1. Here
the verb must clearly be emended to yezuqqm, which [i.e. drops from the sea]
he distils as rain.
In MT le, occurs in the OT only once besides here, in Gen. 2.6. It is
very doubtful if the sense is mist, as Albright has demonstrated (1939: 102ff.
n. 25). in the OT is probably a loanword, Akk. ed, the reservoir of subterranean water from which the land was visualized as being watered before the
rain. The nal vowel of MT may be the last vowel of the Akk. word rather
than the pronominal sufx. The conception seems to be that God draws up
drops from the sea, renes them, purifying them of salt, and replenishes the
fertilizing subterranean water with rain.
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28. The antecedent of aer is nem, the drops from the sea so distilled,
some for the subterranean water and some to fall from the clouds as rain for
the surface of the land.
nzal in Classical Heb. means to ow. The verb is intransitive, and we
prefer to take eqm (clouds) as subject with nepm, or rather its relative
pronoun, understood as internal accusative; cf. Isa. 45.8, eqm yizzel-eeq
(the clouds pour righteousness).
ra is known as meaning to drip, for example, in Prov. 3.20, eqm
yira-l (the clouds drip dew).
r has been taken as the participle of ra, al m r being taken as
upon many men. S evidently took r as an adverb, greatly. In view of
Wrights conjecture that the word is a byform of the more familiar rem,
showers (so also Beer, Ball, Moffatt, Pope), it is surprising that it is retained
as meaning upon many men by G.B. Gray, Dhorme, Hlscher, Fohrer and
Terrien; cf. Mowinckel, who proposes to read amh rabbh (the great
earth). The form rb (showers) is now attested in the Ras Shamra texts as the
name of one of Baals girls, ly bt rb (Dewy the girl of rain, Gordon UT 51
I, 18; IV, 56 etc.). m may mean here as in Prov. 30.14b; Jer. 32.20, the
surface of the earth; cf. Arab. admu(n), as rst suggested by Dahood (1963a:
123-24).
31. On the meaning of yn (to feed), here corroborated by the parallel
yitten-el (he gives food), see on v. 17.
29. MT im has been taken as a corruption of m by practically all modern
commentators since Siegfried, Duhm and Budde, which we doubt, retaining
im as an interrogative particle and understanding the subject of yn as
indenite (so Pope).
We had thought seriously about the emendation of teu to mae
(elevation), an abstract fem. plur., regarding mae sukk (the elevation
of his tabernacle) as a reference to the building of the house (palace) of Baal
in the Ras Shamra Baal myth, which was appropriate to the celebration of the
triumph of Baal as king over the forces of Chaos and drought and sterility at
the New Year festival, when the rains of the new season and their accompanying thunder were anticipated. This would be tting in this passage, the theme
of which is Gods providence and government. We may cite the reference in
Ps. 105.39, pra nn lems (he spread out the clouds as his screen), and
the parallelism between sukk and nn in Ps. 18.12 (EVV 11), as a gurative reference to the clouds as Gods temporary pavilion (so Pope). Graetz
suggested the emendation of MT teu to teuy, an Aram. word meaning
carpet, with the emendation of MT yn to yn (he sets). But teu, from
h (to make a din, crash) is probably to be read here, and at 30.22, where
it means a rainstorm, on which see above. In 36.29 teu would mean
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appropriately the din of thunder. Now in the Baal myth of Ras Shamra Baal
announces his advent as king in thunder and lightning, which is the accompaniment of the heavy rains of winter, as, for example, in Gordon, UT nt III,
17-28:
abn brq dl td mm
rgm ltd nm
ultbn hmlt ar
I will create lightning, which the heavens do not know,

A matter that men do not know,
Nor the multitudes of earth understand.
Many of the psalms relevant to the New Year festival were either adaptations
of Canaanite liturgies of the same occasion or reected their mythology and
imagery. Thus we should retain MT yn teu, agreeing with G.B. Gray,
Dhorme and most modern commentators. The crashing of his tabernacle
means of course the crashing from his tabernacle.
30. With Pope, but independently, we take MT lyw as the corruption of a
title of Yahweh, as it had been of Baal (Gordon UT 126, III, 8), possibly
elyn, possibly in the form l (see also Dahood 1963c: 19).
In v. 30a MT r (light) is read as , so transcribed in Theod. and T
(so Duhm, Budde, Beer, Dhorme, G.B. Gray, Mowinckel, Kissane). This is
then taken as mist, with which God overspread the tops of the mountains
(reading r hrm, with Duhm, for ore hayym, the roots of the sea).
But the meaning mist for , understood apparently as rain by T, is
uncertain and improbable (see on v. 27); hence we take r in the sense of
lightning, as in v. 32 and 37.15.
We take v. 30b as describing a fresh manifestation of Gods power in the
storm, the storm-clouds as the concomitant of the lightning (r) in v. 30a.
The roots of the sea is a meaningless phrase, but MT ore hayym may be a
corruption of ore hrm (the roots of the mountains; cf. 28.9). Dahood
suggests that kissh (to cover) had here the privative sense to uncover; cf.
r (to root and uproot) and Arab. jallada (to skin a beast and cover a
book). The uncovering of the roots of the mountains might be explained in
the light of a passage in the Baal myth of Ras Shamra, where Baal, now in the
ascendant and in his full kingly power, enrages his enemy Death, by drought
and sterility of the summer, which had penetrated the forests and deep glens,
the last refuge of the verdure in summer, as, for example, in Gordon UT 51
VII, 25ff.:
ib bl tid yrm
snu hd gpt r
The foes of Baal occupied the forests,

The enemy of Hadad the inmost recesses of the mountains.
It might be thought proper that Baal in his triumphant lightning-ashes

uncovers the roots of the mountains occupied by his enemies. We should
nevertheless read wer hrm kissh (and he covers the tops of the
mountains), referring to the heavy rain-clouds, which with the thunder and
lightning herald the heavy rains so vital to cultivation.
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32-33. This passage is another notorious crux in the Book of Job, but it is
possible that this may be owing to rare words and faulty word-divisions rather
than to serious corruption of the text. The reading of MT al-kappayim kisshr (he covered both hands with lightning) is suspect, and Dhormes suggestion that this was the corruption of an original n (he took up) rst to
nissh through a scribal error in dictation and then to MT kissh, if unlikely in
the rst stage of the corruption which he assumes, is certainly graphically
feasible in the second. Popes suggestion that the verb in the original text was
nasesh, the 3rd fem. sing. perf. of a verb nsas, which he cites in the Hithpolel
in Zech. 9.16, and possibly in Isa. 10.18 in a passage dealing with burning, is
acceptable. This meaning of this verb to ash is supported by Akk. nassu
(to vibrate), hence Pope renders on his palms the lightning prances.
Flickers or ashes is a more apt rendering in our opinion, and is evocative
of Mesopotamian glyptic, where the lightning in the hand of Adad is
represented by a jagged bolt (e.g. ANEP, pl. 533).
On this interpretation the fem. r is to be noted, this being attested in Jer.
13.16 and in Akk., where the cognate urr is fem.
Taking lh as meaning upon it, that is, the lightning, v. 32b is intelligible in the sense he gives it a charge concerning a target, reading miga for
MT maga after Olshausen; cf. G.R. Drivers conjecture (1955: 90-91) of
wayyalh, citing Arab. alaa, the II Form of which describes the sun
emerging from the clouds. We suggest rather weyaqleh (lit. slings it),
assuming scribal corruption of q to in the Old Heb. script.
33. The ancient versions are discordant and vague about this verse, the MT of
which they nevertheless in some form indicate. The confusion in interpretation
is indicated by the fact that T has three different interpretations, and in 1905
Peake enumerated more than 30, which have since been generously amplied.
For MT
yagg lyw r
miqneh a al-lh,
Dhorme read
yagg lyw r miqneh a alelh
He warns his shepherd of it,
the herd which sniffs the storm.
According to this interpretation there is an allusion to the well-known fact of

animals premonition of a storm. This interpretation is feasible, but is rather an
abrupt change of subject. More recently Hlscher after Duhm proposed MT
r indicated a noun derived from ra (to shout), as a war-cry or cry of
triumph (cf. possibly Exod. 32.18, more commonly terh), and he translates
v. 33a: His triumph-shout gives notice of him. He renders v. 33b: Stirring
up wrath against iniquity, giving the reading of MT miqneh, as meqanneh after
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Bttcher, this being possibly an orthographic variant of meqann. This is

substantially the interpretation of Kissane, Mowinckel, Fohrer and Terrien. In
v. 33a, however, Kissane read raam (the thunder) for MT r, which is
graphically feasible in the Old Heb. script, and Fohrer and Terrien read raam
(his thunder), after Budde. Actually there is no need to emend the consonantal text to raam or raam if r is taken as a cognate of Arab. ra (to
rumble, as thunder). In the mythological fragment RS 24.245 in the description of Baal seated on his holy mountain bundles of thunderbolts (isr rt) are
mentioned with a quantity of lightning bolts (Virolleaud 1968: 557-59), G.R.
Driver (1955: 90-91) proposed that v. 33a and b have been transposed, reading,
with emendations of MT, qnh app alelh weyagg ely raam (By
his anger he creates the storm, and by his thunder he announces its coming).
This, it must be admitted, is intelligible as a description of the continuance of
the storm. None of Drivers emendations is drastic or graphically unlikely,
though one might take exception to the transposition of text. Making a laudable effort to read MT with the minimum of emendation, Pope proposes the
graphically feasible reading yagg l beraam maqn app al awlh
(Ali [the Most High] speaks with his thunder, venting his wrath against evil).
Here we note the substantial agreement with Kissane, Mowinckel, Fohrer and
Terrien in the interpretation of v. 33b. The whole hymn, though describing
Gods order in nature, has the ultimate aim of demonstrating his order in
society, so that the poem might be expected to culminate in just such a declaration. This, to be sure, is not the culmination of the hymn, which continues to
37.13, but it does mark a denite period in it.
Our own preference, which requires only vocalic modication of MT, is for
the reading:
yagg ely r
meqann a al-awlh,
His thunder announces his coming,
Showing zealous wrath against iniquity.
The verbal noun el coming, which we postulate after Driver, recalls the use
of lh in Ps. 47.6, lh elhm bierh. This is an Enthronement Psalm
referring to the Epiphany of God as King at the New Year festival, which, as
we have indicated, contained in its liturgy many elements adapted from the
festival in Canaanite nature-religion. lh here refers symbolically to the
great moment of Gods assumption of his throne in the plenitude of his power,
and in the Canaanite Baal myth appropriate to the same seasonal crisis Baals
power is signalized by thunder (cf. the thunder at the theophany at Sinai;
Exod. 19.22-35). In the context of the Israelite adaptation of the liturgy of the
New Year festival on the theme of the Kingship of God, his order in society is
also emphasized, hence our preference for the reading awlh (iniquity) in v.
33b rather than alelh (storm).
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37.1. yittar may be from nar, attested in 6.9, meaning to be untied, hence
here is dislocated, starts, but Dhorme proposes a connection with Akk. tarru
(to palpitate), which is also possible. The general sense is not affected,
especially as such a convenient translation as starts is available.
2. ql (lit. his voice) is used absolutely for thunder in the OT (e.g. 1 Sam.
12.17; Ps. 18.14 [EVV 13] etc.) and in the Ras Shamra texts (e.g. Gordon UT
51 VII, 29, 31).
rez, which means generally in the OT agitation, anger (e.g. Job 3.17,
26; 14.1), might mean thunder, as in the VIII Form of the Arab. cognate verb
rajaza, a sense which was apparently familiar in Aram. in the rst century CE
from the rendering of ben ruz (Gk. Boanerges) as sons of thunder (Gk.
huioi bronts) (Mk 3.17). In the present passage, however, in view of the
association in 36.33 of thunder with the wrath of God, and the fact that in such
a context ql of itself means thunder, we prefer the usual Classical Heb.
meaning of rez in the present passage. This is supported by the association
of thunder (ql) and the verb raz (to be agitated) in Ps. 78.17-18, which,
like Job 36.2637.13, is replete with the imagery of the Canaanite mythology
from the liturgy of the New Year festival as adapted by Israel.
heeh denotes an inarticulate sound, as the growl of a lion (Isa. 31.4), the
cooing of a pigeon (Isa. 38.14; 59.11). This is the only case where the word is
used of thunder,
3. Tur-Sinai takes yirh as his approval (lit. what seems good to him)
in antithetic parallelism with r, which he renders as his condemnation
(lit. his curse). Alternatively yirh has been taken as the imperf. of a verb
rh cognate with Syr. er (to let loose). Dhorme supposes that the
pronominal sufx refers proleptically to r in v. 3b, but as we have seen in
36.32 this noun is fem.; hence if yirh is a verbal form the object would be
more likely rez. Moreover the fact that v. 4 states that the thunder follows
indicates that v. 3 cannot refer to thunder. With H.L. Ginsberg (1943) we take
yirh as a corruption of erh (his ashing); cf. Arab. ara(y), to ash
repeatedly of lightning. rh is attested in the verbal noun r in a passage in
the Baal myth of Ras Shamra, which corresponds very closely to the present
passage; see Gordon UT 51 V, 70:
wytn qlh brpt
rh lar brqm
And he sends forth his thunder in the clouds,

His ashing to the earth in lightning.
4. For MT yarm, the Hiphil, the Qal yiram should possibly be read.
In v. 4c the verb qa has been taken in the sense to hold back. Budde
noted that v. 4c is defective couplet and proposed to read wel yeaqq
berqm (And he does not restrain the lightnings) in the rst half of v. 4c (so
Beer, Dhorme, RSV, Hlscher, DriverGray, Fohrer, Terrien, Lvque). Pope
accepts this sense of the verb, but reads the nal m in yeaqqem as the
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Canaanite enclitic, taking the subject as indenite and rendering Men stay not
when his voice is heard, a four-beat line which is long and labouring, to say
nothing of the fact that the verb is transitive. We suggest that the nal m in
yeaqqem is the remnant of an original mayim, omitted by haplography
before mipp, which we read for MT k in the last colon. Thus we restore MT
v. 4c:
wel yeaqq mayim
mipp yima ql
And he does not restrain the waters,

As peal upon peal is heard.
We take mipp here as meaning in proportion as, which is usually expressed

by ke (Exod. 16.3; Lev. 25.52; Num. 6.21; 7.5), le (Exod. 12.4; Num.
26.54; Josh. 18.4; 1 Kgs 17.1) or al-p (Gen. 43.7; Lev. 27.8; Deut. 17.10, 11;
2 Sam. 13.32; Prov. 22.6). The rain is the natural concomitant of thunder and
lightning, as in the proverb of the peasants of Palestine, al-baraq almatu lmaar (The lightning is the harbinger of the rain). The Aram. sense of qa
(to restrain) is to be noted here; cf. Arab. aqaba in the VIII Form with the
sense.
5. MT
yarm l beql nil
eh gel wel n
God thunders with his voice wondrously,

Doing great things and we do not know,
is regardless of parallelism, both cola being overloaded. Another reference to

thunder would surely be tedious in this introduction to the other marvelous
manifestations of Gods power and providence in nature. So in v. 5ab beql
may be excised, having perhaps been introduced inadvertently through familiarity with the enumeration of the works of God. yarm may also be
questioned. Duhm proposed yarenn (he shows us, so Hlscher, Fohrer,
Terrien) for which for would be an error of dictation and m a corruption of
n in the Old Heb. script, with nal w a dittograph in the same script. Dhorme
proposed yaaml (he does) for MT yarm, which is nearer the sense, though
yial would be more easily corrupted to yarm in the Old Heb. script. The
metre may be improved by omitting we before l in 5b, and reading:
h gel l-n
He does great things beyond our ken.
6. For MT hew we should probably read hewh. This is the one certain
instance of the verb in the OT and may be an Arabism (cf. Arab. hawa[y], to
fall), though Pope notes that the nouns hawwh and haww in the OT
indicates that the verbal root was not unknown in Hebrew.
In this overloaded couplet, especially in v. 6b, either weeem mr or
e
w eem mier must be omitted as a dittograph, and as a parallel to the
imperative hewh in v. 6a we should read uzz for uzz after Hoffmann. The
plural here suggests that weeem mr should be read and weeem mier
omitted, w in mr being omitted by haplography before m in the Old Heb.
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script. Further we suggest that the omission of le before geem in v. 6b indicates that mar in v. 6a means not to say, but to command, as Arab.
amara. In this case le before ele may be the introduction to the direct object,
as in Aram. The rst colon is still rather long, perhaps because after mar
direct speech is used.
7. MT beya may be emended to bea as in 9.7 with the same verb am (to
seal up; so Hitzig, Duhm, Graetz, Beer, Dhorme, Fohrer, Pope), but insofar as
the passage probably denotes the suspension of activities, beya may be
retained (so Hlscher, Mowinckel, Kissane, Terrien, Lvque).
In MT laa kol-ane maah D.W. Thomas (1954: 56ff.) proposes to
read laa kol-anm, or, better, laa kol- mimmaah (that all
men may be inactive from their work), nding in the verb ya a cognate of
Arab. wadaa (to let go free from restriction) (see on 9.5). This would give a
good parallel to v. 7a. Alternatively the reading may be laa kol-
maah (that every man may know what he does). The sense in this case
would be that a mans enforced inactivity gives him the opportunity to know
how much he depends on God in the ordinary course of nature; cf. Be still
and know that I am God (Ps. 46.11 [EVV 10]). Thomass interpretation, however, best suits the sequel in v. 8.
8. ere, usually ambush, hence lurking-place, is found in the OT in the
sense of a wild beasts lair only once besides, in 38.40, whereas here it is
parallel to menh.
9. The reference in MT haeer and MT mezrm may refer to directions, taken
from the sky. The former, the Chamber, is probably the Chambers of the
South (aer mn), the constellation in 9.9 (so Friedrich Delitzsch,
Dhorme; cf. Duhm, who actually read aer mn). sh is the whirlwind
with its sandstorms and dust-devils, associated with the deserts in the South in
Isa. 21.1. This would indicate that mezrm signies the North, which seems
corroborated by the reference to qrh (cold). The pointing of mezrm
indicates a fem. plur. participle (Piel) of the verb zrh (to scatter, fan or winnow), cf. Arab. ara(y). In fact the Quran (Surah 51.1) actually refers to
riyt, probably the winds that scatter, but what they scatter is not known.
Dhorme is explicit when he states, followed by Hlscher, Fohrer and Pope,
that the Quran here refers to the cold north winds as the scatterers of rain.
10. For MT yitten the passive yuttan may be read with Sym., S and T.
In MT bemq, be, if correct, would be a beth essentiae, meaning in solid
condition; cf. 38.38. mq is the Hophal participle of yaq (to melt or
mould metal); cf. 1 Kgs 7.37. The word is found again in v. 18, describing a
mirror of smooth polished metal.
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11. r in v. 11b evidently suggested to Beer that MT ber in v. 11a should be

emended to brq (so Hontheim, Budde, G.B. Gray, Ball, Dhorme, Pope),
which we consider rather drastic, assuming a scribal error of y for q, which at
any stage of the development of the script is very unlikely. Nor is brq
supported by the versions, which attest either bar (so Sym., V) or ber. S,
rendering delicately (bare), seems to indicate a reading re, which
might be a corruption of birew (with moisture), which is read by Hlscher,
Kissane, Mowinckel, Weiser, Larcher (JB), Fohrer and Lvque; cf. Terrien,
who reads br (hail). rew would be a form of the innitive construct, or
verbal noun, from rwh, like an from nh, a fromh, e from
h, ol from lh, and al from lh, which, with G.R. Driver, we nd
attested in 36.33. The parallelism with v. 11b, however, does not suggest this
reading or interpretation. We take r in v. 11b not as lightning, as in 36.30,
32 and 37.3, but as sun as in v. 21; 31.26; 41.10 and Hab. 3.4, and so are not
predisposed to read brq for MT ber. If ra has the sense it usually has in
Classical Heb., to toil, labour, be burdened (e.g. Deut. 1.12; Isa. 1.14 and the
Targum on Num. 11.11; Deut. 6.11 and Eccl. 2.11; so G.B Gray, Hlscher,
Weiser, Terrien, Larcher [JB], Gordis and Lvque), it might suggest the translation he loads the thick cloud with moisture (so also Mowinckel and
Kissane); cf. the passage in the Quran noted propos of the Scatterers,
where the Burdened Ones (al-milt) are taken by the predominant
Muslim tradition to refer to the clouds as burdened with rain. The parallelism
suggests, however, that the original text behind MT ber is a synonym of r,
hence we suggest the reading br (his bright sun), of which MT ber is a
corruption in the square Heb. script. We may add that brar is used specically of the sun in deeds of emancipation from the the palace at Ras Shamra.
Thus in the text RS 15.125 (PRU II, 1957, 5), a deed of emancipation (dt brrt),
the formula of emancipation is used, km p brrt kmt br qlm bun d lm
(As the sun is clear so S. is clear of obligation for ever). Taking ra in the
sense of Arab. taraa (to thrust away), we may render the couplet Moreover
his bright (sun) thrusts away the thick clouds; its light dispels the cloud. This
suits the sequel, which in our opinion concerns the sun.
12. In v. 12a the meter demands another beat; hence yihall may be read,
having been omitted by haplography before the similar mihapp. mihapp
is used of the aming sword brandished by the cherubim who guarded the way
to the tree of life in the Garden of Eden (Gen. 3.24), but, referring to the sun, it
refers rather to the current rising and setting, going the round of sky and
underworld according to the ancient cosmology. The sense and metre demands
that MT leoolm (emended to lil) should be taken with the next colon,
giving the reading:
weh mesibb yihall
mihapp beabulyw
lil kol-aer yeawwh (for MT yeawwm)
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The reference to the course in circuit (mesibb), turning over at Gods

guidance (taking tabul as an abstract plural), indicates that the subject r is
the sun, as distinct from r meaning lightning in v. 32a, which is feminine.
The 3rd masc. plur. pronom. sufxes in MT leoolm and yeawwm reect a
misunderstanding that br and r refer to different phenomena. The
reference to the sun in our opinion is supported by the sequel in v. 13, where
the sun as the all-seeing is patron of justice, discovering mortals for chastisement (e, lit. rod, LXX paideia) or favour (ar).
MT tl arh is found again in Prov. 8.31 (spelled ar) in parallelism
with ben m with an obviously universal signicance; hence the phrase
may mean the whole habitable world; cf. Ass. talu (the whole round
world).
13. The parallelism with e suggests that ar in v. 13a may be a Heb. or
Aram. form of Arab. rawu(n) (favour). This occurs in an Aram. form re,
cf. the god aru in a Palmyrene inscription, which is rendered Monimos (Arab.
mun imu[n], the Gracious) in the Latin translation Monimos (Ingholt 1928:
42ff.). re or ar would thus be a synonym of ese, which may have been
used to make the somewhat rare Aram. word explicit. The subject of
yamih is God and the object the sun, the second object expressed in the
pronom. sufx being indenite. The verb may be used in the sense of to light
upon. The use of e (a rod) for chastisement is attested in Lam. 3.1. The
reference may be either to the sun as a medium of parching or fertility or as
revealing the works of humans in their true light and according to their true
merits, as in Mesopotamian thought, where the sun-god was the patron of
justice, as explicitly noted in Hammurabis law code.
Job 37.14-24
CONCLUSION OF THE ELIHU SECTION:
ADDRESS TO JOB
After the citation of the Hymn of Praise on the theme of Gods inaccessible
power and wisdom and his providence, Elihu directs Job to appropriate the
signs in nature of Gods transcendent power and wisdom, before which human
limitation makes their questioning of the divine economy mere presumption.
This is the substance of the Divine Address to Job in 38.2ff., and may be an
appendix to the Hymn of Praise (36.2637.13), which rounds out Elihus arguments, thus adapting this addition to the Book of Job and indicating Elihus
agreement with the nal answer of God, as he had noted his disagreement with
the arguments of Job.
The literary form of this section is borrowed from the Divine Address to
Job, which in turn is in the convention of the sapiential controversy where one
sage challenges another with a series of questions. The best illustration of this
is the famous altercation of the Egyptian scribe Hori with Amenope (Erman
1927: 227ff.).
The section may be divided into two strophes, vv. 14-18, which challenges
Jobs understanding of the forces and processes of nature, and vv. 19-24, the
subject of which is the inaccessibility of God, a reection of whose glory
nevertheless, as a cloud shot through by sunlight, gives a hint of his majesty, if
at the same time emphasizing his transcendence (vv. 21-24).
Chapter 37.14-24
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
1
Give ear to this, O Job,

Stand still and consider the wonderful works of God.
Do you know when God lays their functions upon them,1
And how his cloud ashes with light?
Do you know anything about the balancing of the clouds,
The wonders2 of him who is perfect in knowledge,
You whose garments grow hot
When the land is becalmed from the South?
Would you beat out the sky like him,
Hard as a mirror of molten (metal)?
Teach us what we should say to him.
We shall not state our case; we shall keep silence.3
448
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
Job 37.14-24. Conclusion of the Elihu Section

Is it said to him, Nay, but I will speak?
Has anyone ever said, Nay, but he will be told?
Now no one can see4 the sun
When it is obscured in the clouds,
But the wind has passed over and cleared it.5
From concealment comes brightness.6
About God dreadful is the splendour.
The Almighty we cannot attain,
Great in power and justice;
He distorts7 not the case of 8 innocence.
Wherefore let mortals fear him,9
He does not regard any who are wise in their own conceit.
Textual Notes to Chapter 37.14-24

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
alhen for MT alhem.

Reading nile for MT mile with corruption of n to m in the Old Heb. script.
Reading e for MT e. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading r (innitive absolute) for MT r.
Reading watteaharenn for MT watteaharm.
Reading zhr for MT zh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading yeawwh for MT yeanneh.
Reading r for MT r.
Reading yrh with LXX for MT yerh.
Commentary on Chapter 37.14-24

15. m al is ambiguous, meaning to pay attention to (understanding l) or
to lay a task upon (Exod. 5.8) or to set an appointment for (34.23), with a
specied object. Taking nile to denote the wondrous agencies of Gods
immediate activity, we may render the MT of v. 15a as Do you know when
God lays their functions upon them?
16. mile- recalls mire- of 36.29, which is in fact read by Budde.
The variation may be suggested by the parallel word mile, itself an
admissible variation of the usual nile. In mile nevertheless we should
see a formation from pla, a dialectic or orthographic variation of the usual
root plas (to balance, Isa. 40.12; Prov. 16.11).
temm dm (perfect in knowledge) recalls temm d, by which Elihu
designates himself (36.14). Both cases may be instances of the plur. signifying
the abstract noun.
17. The reference to Job sweltering in his clothes in the sirocco might suggest
some reference to the clouds as the garments of God in a line which may have
dropped out. This may have happened through a close resemblance with v. 16
because of a word-play between mile- and something like milbe or
even milpe, or possibly melipp (wrappings, robes) from a root cognate
1
The Book of Job
449
with Arab. laffa. But this is a conjecture. Dhorme understands the reference to
the helplessness and discomfort of humans in the sirocco in the light of what
follows; they are not able to spread out clouds in the sky. Actually in the
sirocco the shade is not particularly desirable since the sky is in any case dull.
We take the reference in v. 18 to be to the appearance of the late autumn
clouds, which herald the end of the season of siroccos, which are most
grievous in September. If there is no reference to the clouds as the robes of
God in such a lacuna as we have conjectured, we must take the reference to
Jobs garments in v. 17 as part of a pregnant clause, You who are so hot that
you cannot bear your clothes. The silence of the land because of the south
wind in v. 17b aptly describes the lifelessness of nature under the sirocco.
Pope felicitously renders When the land is becalmed from the South. The
effect of the sirocco, including the phenomenal stillness remarked upon, here
and possibly in Isa. 25.5, is vividly described by W.M. Thomson (1860: 537):
There is no living thing abroad to make a noise. The birds hide in thickest
shades; the fowls pant under the walls with open mouths and drooping wings;
the ocks and herds take shelter in caves and under great rocks; the labourers
retire from the elds, and close the windows and doors of their houses; and
travellers hasten, as I did, to take shelter in the rst cool place they can nd. No
one has energy enough to make a noise, and the very air is too weak and languid
to stir the pendent leaves even of the tall poplars. Such a south wind with the
heat of a cloud does indeed bring down the noise and quiet the earth.
18. imm implies contention or comparison, Can you vie with him in beating
out the clouds? Note Aram. le as nota accusativa in lieqm. The Hiphil of
rqa, as the parallel colon indicates, does not envisage the sky as a curtain,
but as a solid ceiling beaten out, hence rmament (rqa) in Gen. 1.6, 7, 8;
cf. Exod. 39.3; Num. 17.4; Jer. 10.9. mq means metal melted and set; cf.
mq describing ice in v. 10. The ancient mirror (re), mostly known from
tombs in Egypt, was of smooth, polished metal.
19. naar, lit. to arrange, here ones case, is common in forensic idiom. For
mippen-e (by reason of darkness) Fohrer after Perles reads mippen
e (by reason of speechlessness). a is found with p (my mouth) in
7.11 and with eayim (lips) in Prov. 10.19. Those passages suggest deliberate restraint rather than inability to nd words, and under this consideration
Lvques proposal (1970: 520) may be noted, pn nas (we shall keep
silence).
20. The force of this couplet is emphasized by the conjunction k, meaning
here Nay but, emphasizing a persons determination to command a hearing
from God. In v. 20b, yebulla has been sadly misunderstood. As the parallel
yesuppar, this is the passive of the cognate Arab. balaa (to reach), used in
the phrase balaani (it has reached me, i.e. I am informed; Jacob 1912:
287). The verb is attested, also in the passive, in this sense in 2 Sam. 17.16.
1
450
Job 37.14-24. Conclusion of the Elihu Section
21. The 3rd masc. plur., appearing suddenly in v. 21, is suspect, and we prefer
to read r, the innitive absolute with the indenite subject, people see, but
admit the possibility of the corruption of an original passive participle ry
with r as subject. Here again we take r as the sun. In v. 21b bhr, which
is a hapax legomenon, has been taken as fright after the interpretation of
bahare in Leviticus 13 as bright spot and from Aram. behar and Arab.
bahara, which have this sense. But Friedrich Delitzsch cited Syr. behr
(dark), which Dhorme accepts as the meaning here (so also G.B. Gray,
Kissane, Terrien). In v. 21c there is probably a double entendre in ra,
wind and spirit. The sense is that, not being able to see the sun, obscured as
it is in the clouds, humans may despair, but the wind will clear the sky and
they will see the sun again, so also while in perplexity one cannot compel an
explanation, the spirit of God may make that possible.
22. This verse should probably be taken with v. 21c, with min the
original reading, assuming haplography of w in MT before m in the Old Heb.
script. The colon has been variously interpreted. Assuming MT zh, AV and
RSV render golden splendour (cf. NEB golden glow), and Guillaume (1968:
129) thinks of light rain gilded by the sun, citing Arab. ihbatu(n). Pope would
nd a reference to the Baal myth of Ras Shamra, where the palace prepared for
Baal as King on Mt Saphon is plated with gold. The context, however, indicates an atmospheric phenomenon, brightness after obscurity, which might
support Tur-Sinais suggestion that n means concealment (1957: 517ff.)
He proposed that MT zh is a scribal corruption of zhar (brightness),
which is graphically feasible. G.B. Gray adopts this view, seeing a reference to
the Aurora Borealis, a highly unlikely phenomenon in the Near East. We consider it more likely that the poet has been inuenced by Ezek. 1.4 which refers
to the vision of the storm-wind coming from the North with re and radiance
(nh). About God dreadful is the splendour (v. 22b) may be a secondary
expansion, expressing the belief that at the heart of mystery is God himself,
not to be compelled to a hearing, yet nonetheless manifesting his power and
concern for order in nature and society (v. 23b, c).
23. In menuh we suggest the nuance of the Aram. cognate me (to attain
to); cf. m (to catch up with, Josh. 2.22; l Kgs 13.14; 21.20).
24. The wordplay between yr (to fear, reverence) and rh (to see) is
to be noticed. Fohrer regards this verse as a gloss. However this may be, it
signies the sages admission of the limitations of the humanistic tradition he
represented, as is stated in Prov. 9.10 that the fear of the Lord is the beginning
of wisdom and as the scepticism of Ecclesiastes was corrected by the orthodox redactor who added (Eccl. 12.13) Fear God and keep his commandments,
for this is the duty of all. In view of the Heb. conception of l as the seat of
cognition, akem-l might signify the intelligentsia.
1
INTRODUCTION TO JOB 3841

Chapters 3841 correspond to the theophany or reassuring oracle in the Plaint
of the Sufferer and are demanded moreover as the response to Jobs oath of
purgation in the forensic tradition. The Divine Declaration had a two-fold
signicance. In response to Jobs reiterated appeal to be personally confronted
by God, the fact of the Divine Declaration emphasizes that God cares, and
explodes the conventional view, already belied by the sufferings of the really
worthy man, that suffering in all cases implies sin and alienation from God.
But the author is still sufcient of a humanist not to exceed the evidence of
experience by dogmatizing on how God cares. The personal confrontation
with God which Job had sought is granted, but does not address his personal
problem just as he had hoped. God does not condescend to an apology for his
economy. His ultimate purpose in nature and society is at his own discretion.
It is sufcient for humans that they may discern in the multitude and wonder
of Gods works tokens of the divine wisdom and providential care for his
creatures and accept the situation in which they nd themselves and be
prepared to respond to the will of God in humble dependence (42.4-6).
Like the Egyptian scribe Hori, whose altercation with a rival scribe (ANET,
477-78) the divine reply to Job formally reproduces, God does not explain or
defend himself; he challenges the understanding and agility of his opponent.
This aims to engender in Job a proper sense of his limitations. It challenges
Jobs understanding of creation (38.4-11) and the elemental phenomena of
nature (38.12-38), reminding him that the full signicance of the plan and
purpose of creation is the ultimate secret of the Creator. In his power and
providence he is not to be called in question, but, as is hinted in the angelic
hymn of praise (38.7), praised and adored. But in disclosing marvels beyond
marvels1 God lifts Jobs prospectand his hopebeyond the narrow limits
of individual human experience. Job was abased before the mysterium
tremendum2 (40.4-5; 42.2-6), as it was meant that he should be; but new hope
was kindled by the mysterium fascinans. The very token of the otherness of
God and the evidences of his power and providence beyond the competence of
humankind stimulate hope beyond human limitations.
1. Behind each of its marvels lies another great marvel, and not one of these does God
allow to be taken out of his hand (Von Rad 196265: I, 416).
2. R. Otto (1925: 80-83) has rightly apprehended the signicance of the Divine
Declaration in Job.
1
452
Introduction to Job 3841
Thus in the Divine Declaration the passages on the rain in the desert (38.2627), the wild creatures, the lion (38.39-40), the raven (38.41), the ibexes (39.14), the onager (39.5-8), the wild ox (39.9-12), the ostrich (39.13-18), the
migrant hawk (39.26), the keen-eyed vulture (39.27-30) and the intractable
crocodile (40.25-30 [EVV 41.1-6]) remind humans that they are not the sole
object of Gods providential care, which they call in question on the basis of
their peculiar experience. So setting the problem of human suffering in this
wider perspective in the Divine Declaration, the writer of the Book of Job has
presented it not as an intellectually satisfying answer, but rather as a challenge
to faithnot, however, without encouragement.
The passage on Leviathan (40.25-30 [EVV 41.1-6]) belongs stylistically to
the passages on the animals in ch. 39, introduced as it is by the rhetorical
question addressed personally to Job and emphasizing its characteristic, its
intractability. It was probably displaced after the secondary description of the
crocodile was developed (41.4-26 [EVV 41.12-34]), and situated after the
similar descriptive and secondary passage on Behemoth, the hippopotamus
(40.15-24, 31-32; 41.1-3 [EVV 40.15-24; 41.7-11]).
The Divine Declaration is carefully constructed and may be analysed
according to literary form as follows:
Part I. 38.139.30 with 40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-6), Displaced
A. Introduction
First strophe (38.2-3): Gods challenge to his opponent in a reflection of the
forensic tradition (vv. 2-3a). Job is then called upon to answer to a series of
questions designed to emphasize the limitations to his knowledge, and thus
invalidate his title to question the conduct and propositions of his adversary.
The best example of this literary form is Horis interrogation of a rival scribe,
Amen-em-opet, in his satirical letter from the thirteenth century BCE.
B. Interrogation on the secrets of elemental and natural forces (38.439.30;
40.25-30 [EVV 41.1-6]):
a. in creation (vv. 4-21),
Second strophe (vv. 4-7): the control of the earth;
Third strophe (vv. 8-11): the control of the sea;
Fourth strophe (vv. 12-15): the control of day and, it is implied, night;
Fifth strophe (vv. 16-18): the bottom of the sea and the underworld;
Sixth strophe (vv. 19-21): the source of light;
b. the direction of creation (38.22-38),
Seventh strophe (vv. 22-30): the weather;
Eighth strophe (vv. 31-38): meteorology and related phenomena;
c. providential care for creatures beyond human experience (38.3939.30)
i. in nourishment (38.39-41),
Ninth strophe (38.39-41): the lion and the raven;
ii. in breeding (39.1-4),
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The Book of Job
453
Tenth strophe (39.1-4): the ibex and the hind;

iii. in untameable spirit (vv. 5-12),
Eleventh strophe (vv. 5-8): the onager;
Twelfth strophe (vv. 9-12): the wild ox;
iv. in characteristic properties (vv. 13-30),
Thirteenth strophe (vv. 13-18): the speed of the ostrich;
Fourteenth strophe (vv. 19-25): the strength and spirit of the warhorse;
Fifteenth strophe (vv. 26-30): the flight and sense of direction of the
migrant hawk and predatory vulture;
Sixteenth strophe, displaced (40.25-30 [EVV 41.1-6]): the crocodile
(Leviathan).
Part II. 40.2, 7-14, Conclusion
A. Introduction
Seventeenth strophe (40.2, 7-9): in the same literary form as the introduction
to Part I, but anticipating the limitation of Jobs knowledge of Gods economy
in society.
B. Gods Challenge
Eighteenth strophe (40.10-14): emphasizing human limitations in nature and
particularly in society in comparison with Gods power and ordered rule, so
often the theme of the Hymn of Praise, the style of which is reflected here to
evoke the same theme. Here the literary type of the forensic dispute in its
adaptation to sapiential controversy introduces the two parts of the address
(38.1-3 and 40.2, 7), which is cast in the form of interrogation of an opponent
in sapiential controversy. The systematic grouping of categories, moreover, in
the interrogation in 38.439.30 is also in the sapiential tradition, reproducing
the classied lists of natural and social categories known in ancient Mesopotamian (Matous 1933; von Soden 1930) and Egyptian wisdom tradition
(Gardiner 1947), which became familiar in Israel in the humanist culture of
Solomons3 court and is most familiar in the classied lists in Prov. 30.15-16,
18-19, 21-23, 24-28, 29-31, being reflected elsewhere in Job (e.g. 24.13-17).
But in spite of the style of the law-court and sapiential disputation in the
introduction to the two parts of the Divine Declaration and the sapiential
interrogation and the classied categories in the Declaration itself, the
exaltation of God, which is the object of the Declaration, has elevated the
literary medium occasionally to the style of the Hymn of Praise, as notably on
the passage on creation in 39.4-21, with its rich imagery, where the writer
even cites ancient Canaanite mythology (38.7, 8).
3. Alt 1953: 90-99; Scott 1955. This was probably the source of the tradition that
Solomon spoke of trees from the cedar that is in Lebanon to the hyssop that grows out of
the wall and of beasts and of birds and of reptiles and of sh (1 Kgs 4.33).
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Introduction to Job 3841
In this section the passage on the stupidity of the ostrich and its callous
disregard for its young (39.14-17), noting its phenomenal speed (v. 18) despite
its weak wings (v. 13), disrupts the poem and may be a secondary expansion,
perhaps the citation of a poem on the ostrich. On the other hand it might be
original, the argument being that in spite of the proud plumage of the ostrich,
it is stupid, risking the extinction of its brood by its callousness, yet God
provides for its preservation by its fleetness of foot (so Weiser). In the present
state of the text (see Commentary ad loc.) this is a hard question to decide,
though we prefer the suggestion we made above. Job 40.1f. is probably secondary, the citation of sapiential poems on the beasts in chs. 3839 suggesting
this note in introduction to the dialectic conclusion to the Divine Declaration
to 40.7-14. Job 40.3-5 in its present position renders Gods continued censure
of Job in 40.7-14 unapt, and is displaced from before 42.2-6, 42.1 being redactional after this displacement of text and the insertion of the matter on the
hippopotamus (40.15-24, 31-32; 41.1-3) and the crocodile (41.4-26).
Job 38
THE DIVINE DECLARATION: PART I
Chapter 38
1.
Then Yahweh answered Job out of the whirlwind and said:
2.
Who is this that obscures (our) purpose

By words without knowledge?
Brace yourself like a man1
That I may question you and you may declare to me.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
1
Where were you when I was laying the foundation of the earth?
Tell me, if you know how it was established.2
Who set its measures, if you know,
Or who stretched the line over it?
In what were its bases embedded?
Or who laid down its corner-stone,
When the morning stars cheered together,
And all the beings shouted acclaim?
Who shut in3 the sea with doors,
When it burst forth, issuing from the womb,
When I gave it the cloud as its clothing,
And the dark cloud as its swaddling-band,
And I set the gauge of the bounds to which it might come up,4
And set a bar and doors,
And said, Hither shall you come,5
And here shall the pride of your waves be broken?6
In all your days did you ever order Morning to his post?
Or cause the Day-Star to know7 its place,
Taking hold of the skirts of the earth
That the wicked might be shaken out of it,
It being changed as clay under the seal,
Taking colour8 like a garment,
Their light being withheld from the wicked,
And the uplifted arm broken.
Have you penetrated to the springs of the sea,
Or walked in the sources of the deep?
Have the gates of death been disclosed to you,
Or have you seen9 the frontiers of deepest darkness?
Has your comprehension extended to the breadth of the underworld?
Declare if you know its extent.10
456
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
41.
Job 38. The Divine Declaration: Part I

Which way leads to the home of light,
And where is the abode of darkness,
That you may11 take it to its territory,
Or bring it into its homeward paths?
You know it for you were born of old,
And the number of your days is many.
Have you entered the arsenals of the snow,
And seen the hoards12 of the hail,
Which I have held for the time of distress,
For the day of assault and battle?
Which is the way by which the heat13 is distributed,
Which the sirocco scatters over the earth?
Who cleft a channel for the ood,
And a way for the thunder-shower,
Sending rain on the land unpeopled,
The desert where no human is,
To satisfy the waste wilderness,
And to cause the thirsty land14 to sprout with growth?
Has the rain a father?
Or who has begotten the dew-drops?
From whose womb has the ice come forth?
Or the hoar-frost from the skywho has given it birth,
The waters being congealed15 like a stone,
And the face of the deep solidied?
Do you fasten the bonds16 of the Pleiades,
Or loose the bonds17 of Orion?
Do you bring out the Hyades in their season,
Leading the Bear and its satellites?
Have you appointed18 the laws of heaven,
Do you impose rules19 on the earth?
Can you raise your voice to the clouds,
That a deluge of water may cover it?20
Can you send the lightnings that they go,
Saying, to you, Here we are!?
Who has given wisdom to the ibis?
And who has given wisdom to the cock?
Who can empty out the clouds by his wisdom?
Or who can tilt out the waterskins of the sky,
When the dust runs into a fused mass,
And the clods cohere?
Do you hunt his prey for the lion,
Or satisfy the appetite of the young lions,
When they crouch in their dens,
Lying in wait in the thicket?
Who provides its food for the raven,
When its young21 cry to God,
Staggering22 for want of food?
The Book of Job
457

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
keibbr
Cf.
in one Heb. MS, S and T for MT eeer. See Commentary ad loc.
Conjecturing knh for MT bnh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading m s with T and V for MT wayyse.
Reading wsbr uqq ely for MT wsbr lyw uqq. See Commentary ad
loc.
Either MT wmar or wel ts must be omitted metri causa.
Reading yitabbr gen after LXX and V for MT y bien. See Commentary ad
loc.
Taking h in MT yiddath as a mater lectionis and not as the denite article with
aar as in Qere.
Reading weia for MT weyiyae.
Reading r for MT tireh. On the variant reading see Commentary ad loc.
Reading kammh with LXX for MT kullh.
Reading teenn for MT tn, assuming the omission of after y in the Old Heb.
script by haplography and addition of w after n in the same script.
Reading neur for MT er, the latter having been inadvertently repeated after
its incidence in the preceding colon.
Conjecturing r for MT r. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading miiyyh for MT m, as the parallelism demands, y being corrupted to
in the Old Heb. script.
Reading yiamme for MT yiabb. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading maanadd with LXX for MT maaann.
Reading mser for MT me.
Reading hayat for MT hayat.
Reading mirm for MT mir.
Reading teassennh for MT teassekk, assuming corruption of n to k in the Old
Heb. script.
Reading yelyw (Qere).
Reading yitt for MT yie.
1. The divine name Yahweh is conned to the prose introduction to the Divine
Declaration here, to 40.1 and 6, to Jobs replies to God in 40.3 and 42.1, and to
the prose narrative in the Prologue and Epilogue except for one case in the
Dialogue (12.9) in the citation of a familiar formula. The response of God
from the storm-wind (serh) may be a secondary feature suggested by the
passages on the activity of God in nature in 36.2937.4 in the Elihu Addendum, or it may be suggested by Jobs statement in 9.17 that God crushes him
with a tempest (serh), or it may reect a well-established tradition of the
theophany in Israel (e.g. Pss. 18.8-16; 50.3; Nah. 1.3; Ezek. 1.4; Zech. 9.14).
The association of the serh with re (Pss. 18.8-16; 50.3), the cloud as dust
under his feet (Nah. 1.3), and with the South (Zech. 9.14), suggests the sirocco
from the southern deserts as the medium par excellence of the theophany of
Yahweh as the God of Sinai; cf. the ery manifestation of his presence in
Deut. 33.2; Hab. 3.3-4; and the theophany so expected in 1 Kgs 12.11-12.
1
458
2. mak (obscures or in English idiom befogs) is paralleled by another

meteorological gure maalm (obscures) in 42.3. On h as purpose or
plan, the end as well as the method of counsel, so correctly rendered here
by Dhorme as Providence, see above on 5.12 and 12.13. h is the rmly
conceived and strenuously executed policy of the ruler (Isa. 11.2), who is thus
called y in Isa. 9.5 (EVV 6). Gods purpose (h) will stand rm despite
the incidentals of history (Isa. 46.10; Ps. 35.11) and the little systems
(Tennyson) and designs of humans (Prov. 19.21) and, we may add, in the light
of the present passage and 42.3 in spite of human doubts and the dialectics of
scepticism. Again we note the Aram. form milln.
3. One Heb. MS reads gibbr for MT geer, which is evidently understood by
S and T. geer, however, may be retained, since it gives the full range of the
meaning of the root covered by gibbr, a mature and active man, including a
warrior (gibbr) (Judg. 5.30; Isa. 22.9; 41.16, 20), the responsible head of a
family (Exod. 10.11; 12.37; 1 Chron. 24.4; 26.12; Jer. 43.6; Mic. 2.2; Prov.
6.34), a man condent in his power and in fact an overcondent materialist
(Ps. 52.9 [EVV 7]; Job 33.17). God is thus addressing Job as a mature,
responsible person (perhaps with the nuance an individual in his special care;
cf. the king in 2 Sam. 23.1), but there may also be the hint of a rebuke to one
who in his condence deed (cf. higabbr, 15.25) God or to humans generally in their temporal limitations, which geer signies in Job. 3.23; 4.17;
10.5; 14.10; 16.21; 22.2; 34.5, 17, 29. In view of the parallel colon, Gird up
your loins may be an idiom taken from belt-wrestling as an ordeal in ancient
law, as attested in sculpture and painting from Mesopotamia and Egypt and in
legal documents from Nuzu cited by C.H. Gordon (195051). In strict
dialectic the divine reply is a shocking evasion of the issue. Job had appealed
to God for a hearing, with a direct charge which he might rebut, or an opportunity to justify himself; instead God questions him not on his specic case,
where he would have been at a disadvantage, but only to abash Job with the
limitations of his knowledge and experience. Indeed God even retains the
secret of the relevance of human conduct, and even of faith, to his ultimate
purpose.
4-6. Sometimes the earth, and particularly the sky, is visualized as a Bedouin
tent with curtains stretched out over poles (Isa. 48.13; 51.13, 16; Zech. 12.1),
called in Arab. pillars (awmidu[n]). At other times, as here, a solid building is visualized with foundations (v. 4a; Pss. 89.12 [EVV 11]; 102.26 [EVV
25]; 104.5; Prov. 3.19; Isa. 48.13; 51.13; Zech. 12.1), sunk, as in Babylonian
cosmology, in the lower deep (cf. Ps. 24.2).
The phrase yat bnh is difcult, and Dhorme hardly succeeds in his
interpretation, Do you understand the truth? MT bnh may possibly be a
scribal corruption of kumh (its establishment), that is, how it is set on its base
(mn), which would give an excellent parallel to ph hy beyose-ere
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459
(Where were you when I was laying the foundations of the earth?). If MT
bnh is retained it might mean the master intelligence that the Divine
Declaration inculcates throughout.
The gure of the builders line (v. 5b) recurs in Zech. 1.16. It was a technique in ancient building to mark the wall for level dressing by a cord rubbed
with vermilion or some other marking substance, stretched taut between two
measured marks. The cord was then pulled out and snapped back against the
wall. Some ancient buildings in the archaeological sites in the Near East still
show signs of the vermilion.
6. The bases (anm) on which pillars are set are mentioned in Song 5.15.
They denote also the socketted framework of the Tabernacle (Exod. 26.19).
For the conception that the foundations of the earth were laid in the lower
deep, the primaeval chaos of mud and water, which according to Mesopotamian cosmology was overcome by the god Marduk, earlier by the Sumerian
Enlil, prior to the ordered creation of nature, cf. Ps. 24.2. The question in v. 6a
implies time, place and forces beyond the power and even the knowledge of
humans. Mention of the bases of the earth suggests the capstone, or cornerstone (een-happinnh; cf. heen hrh, Zech. 4.7) in antithetic
parallelism.
The verb yrh (lit. to throw down) is used of the setting up of a standing
stone (mah) by Laban in Gen. 31.51.
The laying of the corner-stone was accompanied by auspicious acclamation,
for example, n n (Grace! Grace!, Zech. 4.7). Acclamations and fanfares
of trumpets and clanging of cymbals are noted at the foundation of the Second
Temple (Ezra 3.10). Thus a positive antidote was provided against the possible
inuence of the evil eye or the curse of an enemy.
7. rn, the innitive construct, verbal noun of rnan, indicates the rinnh, or
cheer, appropriate to this auspicious occasion, as wayyr indicates the
raising of the terh, the shout of acclamation, or triumph. Humanity not yet
being created, acclamation is voiced by the stars (v. 7a), the divine beings
(ben elhm) (v. 7b). The apparent equation of these two indicates the conception that the stars were divine. Israelite orthodoxy had relegated the stars as
manifestations of gods to the status of the supernatural retinue of God, either
in his court (e.g. 1 Kgs 22.19) or in his armies (e hamayim) (Jer. 33.22).
The conception of the stars as manifestations of gods is illustrated in the myth
from Ras Shamra (Gordon UT 52) celebrating the birth to El of the senior god
of the Canaanite pantheon of the Venus-star in its twin manifestations r
(Dawn) and lm (Completion [of day]). The acclamation of God by the
heavenly bodies recurs in Pss. 19.2 and 148.2-3.
8. MT wayyse (and he has closed in) should be emended with T and V m
s (who closed in?).
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Balls proposal, citing 5.22, to read bel (with sand) for MT bielayim,
is metrically feasible, but in view of the wealth of colourful mythological
imagery in this passage, and particularly v. 10, it is extremely prosaic.
Actually delayim (double doors) suggests the bolts and bar with which the
triumphant Marduk conned his adversary Tiamat (the lower deep) in the
Babylonian cosmic myth, which culminated in creation (ANET, 67, ll. 139-40),
aptly cited by Pope. The control of the sea is the expression of Gods control
over primaeval chaos, the theme of the Babylonian New Year festival at the
vernal equinox, and of the Canaanite myth of the conict of Baal and the
unruly waters (Gordon UT 129; 137; 68; see our translation and commentary
in The Legacy of Canaan 1965: 21-38), which probably related to the
Canaanite New Year festival at the autumnal equinox, to which the same
theme related in the Enthronement Psalms in the OT.
ga means to gush forth, hence Gihon, one of the rivers of the Garden of
Eden (Gen. 2.13, J) and Gihon (the Gusher), the intermittent spring in the
Qidron Valley at Jerusalem.
9. If the reference to the birth of the sea (v. 8b) and its being swaddled in
Darkness (v. 9b) is mythological, as the personication and the context
suggest, the source is so far unknown, like the birth of the world after travails
in Ps. 90.2.
10. MT webr ly uqq cannot mean, to yield any sense, and I broke my
prescribed bound over him. We take the verb as a homonym of ar (to
break), cognate with Arab. abara (to estimate), as suggested by Guillaume
(1963: 123), and suggest the transposition of MT lyw and uqq, reading
with emendation only of the vowels, webr uqq ely (and gauged the
bounds to which he might come up). On the form of the verbal noun from
lh and other l/h verbs, see on 36.33. For the general conception, cf. Isa.
40.12.
11. wel ts should probably be omitted metri causa.
In MT y bien a possible emendation is the transposition of t and b,
thus yib gen (pride will be stayed), which has some support in S.
Actually LXX and V indicate a reading yitabbr, or yir, gen (pride
will be broken). We decide the matter in favour of one of the latter alternatives, since we see a word-play between ar (gauged) in v. 10a and ar
(broke) in v. 11b.
12. Now that aar (Dawn) is known as a Canaanite god from Ras Shamra
(see above on v. 7), bqer in v. 12a also may be understood as a god (DayStar), as the verb ordered (iww) suggests.
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461
13. The gure here is possibly that of the Bedouin who sleep in their cloaks on
the ground and in the morning shake the dust and the vermin out of them. The
association of night and wickedness is universally familiar, and is the subject
of the very striking passage on criminals in 24.13-17. We attempt to reproduce
the gure by rendering MT rem as pests; cf. Isa. 22.17.
14. In MT mer m Dhorme understands red medicinal earth, which Pliny
attests as exported with trade-seals from Lemnos. Dhorme takes v. 14a to refer
to the colour that earth assumes after sunrise. In view of the lapse of about half
a millennium between the Book of Job and the time of Pliny, this is a hazardous interpretation. It is more likely to denote the distinctive contours revealed
after sunrise as clay after sealing (mer m). Clay sealings are familiar in
excavations in the Near East, for example, a clay stamp with a South Arabian
sealing from ninth-century debris at Bethel, a relic probably of the caravanborne incense trade with South Arabia (Van Beek and Jamme 1958: 9-16).
MT weyiyae (and they stood up) in association with a garment is not
intelligible, and is generally taken after Ehrlich and Beer as a corruption of
wetiba (and assume colour, lit. are dyed). The variegated colours of
clothing are illustrated in the patterns and coloured robes of semi-nomadic
tribespeople in the panel depicting the party under the chief Absha, who
brought eye-salve to Egypt, in a mural from a nineteenth-century tomb at Beni
Hasan (ANEP, pl. 3).
15. This couplet is possibly transposed from after v. 13, probably a gloss
prompted by the recollection of the passage on nocturnal criminals in 24.13-17.
zera rmh is an instance of the tendency in Classical Heb. to particularize a sin in a bodily member, e.g. haughty eyes, lying lips, etc. The phrase
recalls the high hand of Exod. 14.8 and Num. 15.30; 33.3.
16. In MT nie-ym it has been proposed to emend to mie-ym, but nbk
parallel to mqr (source) is attested in the Ras Shamra Legend of King Krt
(Gordon UT, 216). The passage is reminiscent of the vain quest of Gilgamesh
for immortality through the gates guarded by the scorpion-man on his way
over the waters of death. qer, from the verb qar, denotes search and the
object of search, and the ultimate source.
17. The verb glh in the particular context of v. 17a recalls gly in the Ras
Shamra texts, which is used of crossing the threshold in the stock phrase gly
d, which we render clear the threshold (Arab. addu[n], barrier). The
Arab. verb jala(y) means to emigrate, Heb. glh, to go into captivity. In v.
17a the verb has rather the sense of reveal as the parallel r (for MT
tireh) and hibnant and yat in v. 18b indicate. As in the case of
apparent synonyms in the same couplet in Job, there may be a word-play
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between aar in Classical Heb. in v. 17a (gate) and aar, cognate with
Arab. aaru(n) (frontier) in v. 17b (so Guillaume 1963: 124). Alternatively,
as LXX suggests, v. 17b may mean Do the gate-keepers of the darkness fear
you?, reading wear almwe (or wear mwe, the gate-keepers of
Death) r for MT weaar almwet tireh. This might reect the keepers
of the various gates of the underworld, the scorpion-man of the Gilgamesh
Epic or those encountered by Ishtar in her descent to the underworld (so
Larcher, JB). If MT is correct there may be a particular reference to the seven
gates in this Mesopotamian myth (ANET, 107).
18. raa-re recalls iritu rapitu (the broad land, i.e. the underworld; cf.
Isa. 14.9, and also in Ugaritic, cf. rpiar, defunct kings in the underworld).
For MT kullh in v. 18b we prefer Duhms emendation kammh (its extent)
after LXX; cf. Arab. kam (how much), kamyatu(n) (quantity). This is a
better parallel to raeb-re in v. 18a.
20. The parallelism indicates that for MT tn we should read teenn,
assuming the omission of by haplography after y in the Old Heb. script.
21. The tone is sarcastic; Job is ironically treated as Wisdom, Gods assessor
(Prov. 8.22ff.), and the repository of the secrets of his purpose in creation. T
and S lose the point in the irony in treating the verse as a question.
z denotes a decisive juncture in the argument, narrative or historical
record, being a regular formula in the Books of Kings, in which Montgomery
(1934) has detected the feature of annalistic sources. It may also mean,
particularly with the preposition min, remote antiquity; cf. Isa. 44.8; 45.21,
where it is parallel to qedem, Isa. 48.3, 5, 7, 8; Ps. 93.2, where mz is parallel to mlm, and probably Ps. 46.2 (reading mz for MT me) and Prov.
8.22. The last passage, referring to Gods creation of Wisdom as the rst of his
works, is particularly relevant to the signicance of z in the present passage.
22. er, if it means treasures of the elements, recalls Deut. 28.18; Jer.
10.13; Pss. 33.7; 135.7. The conception of keeping such elements for a visitation is familiar, as for example in Ben Sira 39.23ff., in the plagues of Egypt
(hail); Ezek. 13.13 and specically, in view of the reference to war, in the hailstorm in Josh. 10.11. This reference and the reference to war in v. 23b indicates the specic meaning arsenals, as in Jer. 50.25. The incidence of
apparently the same word in parallelism is suspect. This suggests that er
in v. 22b is either a scribal corruption or a homonym. If the former, we might
suggest neur (hoards). If er in v. 22b is a homonym we may recall
Baals panoply in his royal seat in the mythological fragment RS 24.245, 11.67 (Virolleaud 1968: 557), including lightning and thunder, ir rt (bundles of
thunderbolts); so in v. 22ber br might mean concentrations of hail.
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24. Hoffmann assumed that LXX mist, for MT r, suggested an original

(cf. the problematic in Gen. 2.6); so Bickell, Duhm, Hontheim, Dhorme,
Terrien, Pope, who takes it as an Akkadian loanword ood. With regard for
the parallelism with qeem (east, wind, sirocco), Ewald emended to ra (so
Merx, Wright, Budde, Hlscher, Mowinckel, Fohrer). The corruption of r to
ra is graphically most unlikely. G.R. Driver (1955: 91-92) proposes the
pointing r, meaning heat, citing its incidence in Isa. 31.9; 44.16; 47.14;
50.11; Ezek. 5.2; and probably Zech. 14.6. Particularly relevant to the present
passage is Arab. ru(n), cited by Freytag, for the heat of the sirocco. We
admit the possibility of the meaning of laq, to create (cognate with Arab.
alaqa), which was regularly used by Ben Sira, but the parallelism with y
(for MT y), indicates that the meaning is distributed, as -zeh haddere
suggests.
25. pele is an irrigation channel in Ps. 1.3.
telh, with an Arab. cognate, is known as the channel from the spring of
Gihon in Jerusalem in 2 Kgs 18.17, and as Hezekiahs tunnel in 2 Kgs 20.20.
ee is a ood; cf. Ezek. 13.11; 28.22, geem (rain that oods
away).
ql means thunder-peals (see on 37.2), which suggests that the rare
word azz is a concomitant of the thunder. The word is attested only here and
at 28.26 and in Zech. 10.1, where azzm is in parallelism with rain. The
association with thunder might suggest that the lightning is thought of as a
thunderbolt, if we may connect the word etymologically with Arab. azza (to
pierce). But the association with rain in vv. 25a and 26, and in 28.6 and Zech.
10.1, indicates that it may be the thundershower, perhaps so described as
piercing the clouds or the ground after the long summer drought; cf.
Chaucers Prologue to the Canterbury Tales:
Whan that Aprille with his shoures sote
The Droughte of Merche hath perced to the rote.
The word may occur in the Ugaritic Legend of King Krt (Gordon UT Krt, 9293) where the march of an army is described:
hlk lalpm
wlrbt kmyr
Having with reserve translated this couplet,

Marching in thousands, clanking,
Yea, in tens of thousands as a dust-storm (J. Gray 1966a: 13, 41),
we now relate zz to azz in these OT passages, and translate:

Marching in thousands like a deluge,
Yea, in tens of thousands like the early rains.
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26. The rain on the desert is more impressive evidence of divine power and
grace than in the settled lands with their regular seasonal rains. Here it may
serve to remind the sufferer that the Providence of God is wider in scope than
his personal experience.
27. h meh is found, again denoting the desert, in 30.3 and Zeph. 1.15.
For the collocation masc. and fem. with the same meaning is designed to
convey the sense of completeness; cf. Jer. 48.46,
y-le m
a am-kem
k-luqqe bnk bae
eney babeyh
MT m dee may be emended either to mim (from the thirsty land, cf.
Isa. 44.3; so Budde, Wright, Duhm, DriverGray, Kissane, Pope) or miiyyh
(from the dry land, so Beer, Dhorme, Hlscher, Tur-Sinai, Fohrer).
28. In eel-l the rst word is a hapax legomenon, meaning according to an

Arab. etymology (ajale, to concentrate) concentrations of dew globules.
29. ker, parallel to qera (ice) is in little doubt, meaning hoarfrost, to
which manna is compared (Exod. 16.14). It is mentioned with snow as being
sprinkled on the ground in Ps. 147.16.
30. yiabb in the description of freezing seems to defy direct etymology.
It may be either a textual corruption of yiamme in the square script or a
dialectic variant, as Hitzig proposed (cf. emh, coagulated milk or butter),
and accepted by Dhorme, Hlscher, Kissane, Pope. The interchange of the
labials b, p and m is not uncommon in the Semitic dialects, for example, Heb.
eme, Ugaritic p, and in Ugaritic ybmy/ymmt (female relative, sister-inlaw); cf. Moscati, Spitaler, Ullendorff, von Soden (1964: 25-26). Fohrer
retains MT, and understands MT keen as keeben; cf. GKC, 118w,
rendering the waters are hidden as in a stone. yilakk is used of the scales
of the crocodile interlocking in 41.9 (EVV 23), literally grasping one another.
The Arabic cognate lakada may be cited, which means in the Vth Form to
be congealed. This was understood by the Targum of Job from Qumran
(yiqare, freeze).
31. kmh is rendered Pleiades in LXX and V. It is found in parallelism with
kel (the Presumptuous Fool, Orion) in 9.9 and Amos 5.8. It is probably
connected etymologically with Arab. kumu(n) (a herd of camels). AV the
sweet inuence of the Pleiades, which were associated with consequent
vegetation, is an example of imaginative interpretation, which uncritical
acceptance of MT often involves. The word rendered sweet inuences is MT
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465
maaann, which is known besides only in the passage describing the death
of Agag (1 Sam. 15.32), who went maaann, which AV renders delicately,
obviously inuenced by the noun en (delight); cf. maaannm, which
means delicacies in Gen. 49.20 and Lam. 4.5. Actually, as indicated by the
verb qar (to bind), the word should be read maanadd (bonds, so LXX
and T), both here and probably also at 1 Sam. 15.32; cf. the verb na, which
means certainly to bind in 31.36 and in Prov. 6.21, where it is parallel to
qar. The parallelism and the verb p (lit. to open, hence unloose)
indicates that the unknown me of MT should be read mser (bonds) (so
S), but LXX renders fence, reading misea, which is feasible but inferior to
mser. The reference is not to Orion as a fettered giant, which is unknown in
the ancient Near East, but, as Fohrer has observed, to xed constellations, as
the bonds of the Pleiades also indicate.
32. mazzr is identied, and confused, with mazzl (lit. stations) of
Babylonian astronomy, by T. These are known as the planets or signs of the
Zodiac. In its time, however, indicates that as in the rest of the passage a particular constellation is denoted, as S and V understood. Michaelis associated
the word with nzer, rendering Diadem. Dahood (1963c: 33) derived the
word from zr, which would suggest the spelling mezr, presumably with
reference to the Hyades. But zr and its cognates mean to squeeze, or twist,
the connection with owing for which Dahood contends being limited to the
matter being pressed out of a wound (mzr, e.g. Isa. 1.6; Jer. 30.13; Hos.
5.13). mazzr may be a term indicating a vocation, from the verb mzar,
cognate with Arab. mazara used in the II Form meaning to ll up waterskins,
a task which was womens work in the East, hence the feminine form in Heb.
With the signicance of the association with the rainy season, we retain the
meaning Hyades. On the signicance of , which should probably be read
for MT ayi, see on 9.9. This may be the Great Bear, called by the Arabs the
Bier, al-waa(tu). al-bneyh (lit. over and above her sons) suggests
Arab. bantu l-waa(ti) (lit. the daughters of the Bier), denoting the three
stars in the tail of the Great Bear.
33. The parallel tm mir (for MT mir) suggests that MT yat here
may be the cognate of Arab. wadaa (to lay down, deposit), so here Have
you imposed (the laws)? Duhm proposed that MT yat might be pointed
yiddat and rendered Have you made known? But that would demand
another object, as in v. 12. We assume corruption of yat (have you
appointed).
Final w in MT mir, but with no immediate antecedent, as a pronominal
sufx, may be the corruption of an original m in the Old Heb. script. The root
ar is known in Classical Heb. through the participle, which is used of
ofcers who see that rules are carried out (Exod. 5.14; Deut. 1.15; Josh. 1.10;
3.3; Prov. 6.7). Aram. er (a document) is derived rather from Akk.
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aaru (to write). Arab. miaratu(n) means a paper-ruler, hence our

translation rules.
34. As the association with a deluge (iea-mayim) in v. 34b and the lightning in v. 35a indicates, there is double entendre in qle meaning voice
and thunder.
On ieh (abundance, overowing), see on 22.11.
In v. 34b, LXX alone of the ancient versions renders the verb that they may
obey you, evidently reading taan for MT teassekk. This is accepted by
Duhm and Mowinckel; cf. Terrien (respond to you). Fohrer suggests the
reading teasseh (cover it, i.e. the earth). We accept this sense of the
passage, but suggest that an original teasseh was corrupted in the Old Heb.
script to teassekk. Possibly, however, LXX has preserved the correct reading,
MT being occasioned by scribal familiarity with 22.11b, with which this colon
is verbally identical.
36. This couplet has caused great trouble to interpreters both ancient and
modern. T and Jewish scholars were evidently familiar with a word u
meaning kidneys, since they so translate u here and in Ps. 51.8, where it
is parallel to sm (secret), the only other place where it is used in the OT.
This would suggest that the couplet is an ironical rhetorical question in
parenthesis to the context, hence RV:
Who hath put wisdom in the inward parts,
Or who hath given understanding to the mind?
It has been suggested that MT ew in v. 36b may be a corruption of kesl

(fool).
The bewildering variety of interpretations of u and ekw in the versions
is notorious; for example, for skill in weaving, the word evidently
being derived from wh (to spin) (LXX), kidneys as the seat of reection
(T, V), secretly (S); and, for ew variegated work, possibly inuenced by
the doubtful eiyy (pictures) in Isa. 2.16 (LXX), heart(1st T), cock (2nd
T, V), understanding (S).
Commentators therefore found this very much an open question and there is
no lack of conjectures. It must sufce to give only those which are most
feasible.
u has been taken to refer to celestial phenomena, which the context
might possibly suggest, signifying perhaps those that are overcast (lit.
smeared), so clouds, in which case wisdom could only refer to the clouds
as presages of the weather. In this connection Arab. au(n) is cited (Hirzel).
Another suggestion is that u is a cognate of Arab. a (to wander) and
means meteors (Schultens). For ew, the Aram. eh is adduced to support
the meaning consideration, the meaning given in S.
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The explanation of this variety of interpretation in the versions is probably

that both are foreign loanwords. The former is probably Egypt. wtj (the
Ibis), the bird of Thoth, the god of letters and wisdom (so Hoffmann, Dhorme,
Steinmann, Larcher, Fohrer).
Pope adopts Hoffmanns suggestion that ew is connected with the Coptic
name for the planet Mercury, and takes the reference of u to be Thoth.
Such a reference is unlikely in a sober work of Jewish philosophy, especially
in the divine speech. Mowinckel also connects u and ew respectively
with the planets Mercury and Saturn; cf. sakk, for MT sikk in Amos 5.26.
ew the cock is familiar in Late Heb. and Aram., as the 2nd T suggests;
being according to Dalman a foreign loanword. Both birds were accredited
with prescience, the ibis of the Nile oods, and the cock of the rain (Jaussen
1924: 574ff.).
The wisdom of the cock in being able to distinguish between the night and
day was respected among the Jews, and is explicitly mentioned in the statutory
morning prayer. The domestic hen, bred from the Indian game fowl, was
introduced to Western Asia via Persia at the end of the seventh century BCE. A
ne gure of a ghting cock is known on the seal of Yaazaniah from Tell enNasbeh (Mizpah) at the end of the Jewish monarchy in 586 BCE (ANEP, pl.
277)
37. In v. 37b the reference to the waterskins of the sky (niel mayim)
supports the meaning tilts for yak (cf. Arab. akaba and the name of the
constellation Aquarius kibu lmi). This indicates that sippr in v. 37a has
not its usual meaning in Classical Heb. to count or tell, as G.B. Gray,
Dhorme, Hlscher, Kissane, Mowinckel, Weiser, Fohrer, Pope and Terrien
among modern commentators assume (cf. NEB to marshal the clouds; and
hassr ar ha hammabi et-am hre, 2 Kgs 25.19). G.R. Driver
(1955: 92) takes the word as a dialectical variant of Arab. safara, which is
used of clearing the clouds from the sky or of women unveiling the face.
Actually a close correspondence, and one which gives a more satisfactory
meaning in the context, is with Arab. safara, which means in the IVth Form
to empty out a vessel, which we accept. The reference to the decanting of the
clouds with wisdom refers to the regular rains in due season, the heavy early
rains (yreh) and the latter rains (malq).
38. eqe is the innitive construct and mq the Hophal participle of yaq
(to pour out). The general meaning of rem (clods) is not in doubt,
thanks to the parallel r (dust). We are more doubtful about its association with the only other instance of the word in the OT at 21.33, where we
have emended MT rie naal; see Commentary ad loc.
39. ere associated with l (lion) indicates that t means to hunt, but
read as teayy, which is graphically feasible, it would mean provide food,
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which ere might mean (e.g. 24.5; Ps. 111.5; Prov. 31.15; Mal. 3.10) as well
as its more usual meaning prey. This might be supported by the parallel verb
temall (ll). We prefer the former meaning, though admitting a double
entendre.
In v. 39b ayyh, probably appetite, is to be noted as the sole example of
the word in this sense in the OT. There may be the nuance of sustenance,
however; cf. Arab. muytu(n) (nourishment given to young children).
41. ayi denotes generally provision for a journey (e.g. Gen. 42.25; 45.21;
Exod. 12.39; Josh. 1.11; 9.11; 1 Sam. 22.10), but is here used generally.
Observing that wandering (yi) suits the old beasts rather than the
young, Hlscher assumes a lacuna of a colon before v. 41c (so also Fohrer).
Pope takes the verb in a psychological sense, rendering frantic for lack of
food, which is possible, though when used in a physical sense th has an
ethical connotation. It means in the Niphal to stagger in 12.25, as indicated
in LXX, and in Isa. 19.14; 28.17, where it is used of the staggering of a drunken
man. Though staggering is not quite unsuitable for young birds, Hlscher
and Fohrer may well be right in assuming a lacuna in this verse of three cola in
a predominant arrangement of bicola.
In v. 41b the conception of the young ravens crying to God (el-l) is
strange. el-l may be intended to suggest the woeful cry alelay (Woe is
me!, Job 10.15), if indeed it is not a corruption of that interjection.
Job 39 and 40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-6)

THE DIVINE DECLARATION: PART II
Chapter 39
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
appointed1
Have you
the time for the ibexes to give birth,
Keeping watch over the calving of hinds?
Counting the months of their pregnancy,
Do you know when they shall bring forth,
Crouching down and bringing forth2 their young,
Shooting out their foetus?3
Their young ones thrive and grow up;4
They go forth and do not come back.
Who let the wild ass go free?
Yea, who loosed the bands of the brayer,
Whose home I have made the steppe,
And the salt-land his haunts?
He laughs at the tumult of the city,
He does not listen to the shouts of the driver;
He spies out5 the mountains as his pastures,
And searches after every green thing.
Will the wild ox be willing to serve you?
Or spend the night by your manger?
Will you bind a yoke on his massive bulk?
Will he draw your furrow straight in the plain?
Could you trust his great strength,
Or leave to him what you have toiled for?
Would you rely on him to come back,7
And gather your crop to the threshing oor?8
The wing of the ostrich is weak
In comparison with the wing of the stork or the hawk.9
Nay, she leaves her eggs on the ground,
And neglects them in the dust,
And forgets10 that a foot may crush them,
And a wild beast trample on them.
Her young she treats harshly11 as none of hers;12
Her toil is in vain, she has no chick.13
For God has made her forget wisdom
And has given her no share of understanding.14
470
Job 39 and 40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-6). The Divine Declaration: Part II
18.
When occasion arises in running15 she spreads her tail-feathers,

Laughing at the horse and his rider.
19.
Do you give the horse strength?

Do you clothe its neck with its mane?
Lo! you may send him hurtling16 on his way like locusts,
His glorious snorting spelling terror.
He paws17 in the plain, exulting;18
In strength he goes out to meet the weapons;
He laughs at fear and is not dismayed,
And he turns not back from the sword.
19
The quiver may twang about him,
The ashing spear and javelin,
Quivering and excited he swallows the ground,
His whole trust in the sound20 of the trumpet.
To the accompaniment21 of the trumpets he neighs Aha!
And from afar he scents the battle,
The thunder of the captains and the war-cry.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
Is it by your wisdom that the hawk takes wing,

That he spreads his wings to the Southwind?
Is it at your command that the vulture towers,
And that the falcon22 makes his nest so high?
The rock is his habitation, and his night-roost
Is upon the crag of the rock and the fastness.
From there he spies out food,
His eyes scan afar.
His young23 gulp up24 blood,
And where the slain are, there is he.
40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-6)

25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
Can you draw out25 Leviathan with a hook?

26
Or contend with him with a line in despite of his teeth?
Can you put a bridle27 on his snout,
Or pierce his jaws with a hook?
Will he make many supplications to you?
Or speak softly to you?
Will he make a compact with you
That you should take him for a servant for ever?
Could you make a pet of him like a bird,
And put him on a string for your little girls?
Will the wholesale merchants haggle over him?
Will they divide him among the retailers?
Textual Notes to Chapter 39 and 40.25-30

1.
2.
3.
1
Reading yat for MT yat. See Commentary ad loc.

Reading tealln for MT teallan.
Reading aelhen for MT eelhem.
The Book of Job

4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
471
Omitting babbr as a dittograph and corruption after yirb, metri causa.

Reading yr for MT yer.
Reading haiqr nr baa /im-yeadd bmeq ar. See Commentary ad
loc.
Reading y (Kethib) for MT y (Qere).
Reading wezara ornh for MT zare wegorne.
Reading kena yenm neelzh /im-era ash wenh. See Commentary ad
loc.
Reading weika for MT wattika.
Reading taqa with two Heb. MSS for MT hiqa.
Reading kel-lh for MT lel- lh.
Reading pera for MT pa.
Verses 14-17 are possibly a secondary expansion. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading bemr for MT bammrm.
Reading hn tarenn for MT haarenn.
Reading yapr with LXX, S and V for MT yaper.
Reading y for MT wey.
Reading tronnh aph. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading beql for MT ql.
Reading beya for MT be.
Reading we r yrm qinn after 11QtargJob. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading eryw for MT erw.
Reading yelale for MT yeale. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading haim with one Heb. MS for MT tim.
Reading eeel tikeh al inny for MT eeel taqa le n, assuming
corruption of h to y in the Old Heb. script in MT taqa and the omission of y in
innyw, resulting in MT len after the wrong division of al innyw. See
Commentary on 40.25-30.
Reading zmm with 11QtargJob for MT amn.
Commentary on Chapter 39; 40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-6)

1. MT yat, as suggested by timr in v. 1b, would, if correct, mean take
note of (cf. Amos 3.2), in which case might be a dittograph of the last two
consonants of yat. But the reference to the control of the breeding of the
ibex in v. 2b indicates that it is not a case of knowing when the beasts would
cast their young, but of being able to arrange it as in the case of domestic
cattle, hence yat should be read have you appointed the time? This
having been arranged, the counting of the months of gestation and the
knowing of the time of birth (v. 2) would naturally follow; hence in v. 2b we
should retain MT weyat. The author probably exploits the opportunity of
word-play, so congenial to him, between ya and ya.
The ibex, yl (Arab. walu[n]), mentioned besides only twice in the OT
(1 Sam. 24.3; Ps. 104.18), where it is associated with the rocks in desert
regions (1 Sam. 24.3), was apparently almost as rare in the time of the author
of Job as at the present day, where Doughty notes it as known, but as a rarity,
in the Hejaz.
1
472
3. kra (lit. to bow down) describes the posture of women in childbirth in

the ancient East; cf. 1 Sam. 4.19 and in the Ras Shamra texts, e.g. Gordon UT
75.I, 26-27, where the root is not kra but a form of brk, a denominative verb
from brkm (knees).
tealln (for MT teallan), with the direct object yalehen, is found of
giving birth in 21.10, and is read by most modern commentators.
In v. 3b aelhem should be read for MT eelhem. This word used to be
taken as birth-pangs, but it is now recognized that it means their young, a
tting parallel to yalehen in v. 3a and the object of the verb in v. 3b; cf.
Arab. ablu(n) (foetus) and ibbl (to conceive) cited by Dhorme in Ps.
7.15 and Song 8.5. Fohrer, however, retains MT, translating they are free from
their birth-pangs.
4. In v. 4a babbr (in the open country) (cf. Arab. bariyatu[n], [desert]), is
probably to be omitted, metri causa, as a dittograph after yirb, though it is
attested in all versions.
yalem has an Arab. cognate (to be healthy), but in view of the meaning
of this verb in the V form, to put on esh, this may be the meaning here,
especially in conjunction with yirb. The English thrive matches the
ambiguity of the Heb. word in this respect.
5. illa o is a legal phrase, used of release from domestic servitude (Deut.
15.12ff.). Dhorme sees an apt gure here of the wild ass, visualized as a tame
ass set free.
r is an Aram. word, one of the many instances in Job of an Aram. word
used as a synonym of a Heb. word in parallelism. It is an appellative, the
brayer (cf. Arab. arada, to bray), and is actually used of the wild ass by the
Arab poet Imru al-Qais. In the Babylonian Talmud, Berakot 9b, r is
compared and contrasted with the ass (amr) as the wolf with the dog, in discussing the time to recite the Shema when it is sufciently light to distinguish
the one from the other.
6. melh recalls ere melh, parallel with (ere) l (the uninhabited land), as the haunt of the wild ass in Jer. 17.6. Etymologically the
salty land as contrasted with the fruitful land; for example, Ps. 107.34 denotes
the crust of chemical deposits drawn from the soil and deposited on the surface
in evaporation. Such soil must be washed out, bleached, before agriculture is
possible. This may be observed in the south part of Iraq, where Van Beek
(1962: 13) compares the salty deposit to hoar-frost, and observes that 2 per
cent salt means no wheat, 1 per cent no barley and 2 per cent no dates.
7. hmn signies both the sound, as here, and the number of a crowd (e.g.
Judg. 4.7; 1 Sam. 14.16; etc.). It describes the familiar turmoil of the city, as
here, in Isa. 32.14.
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473
tesu, which means shouting here, means the din of thunder in 36.29.
n, which means task-master in 3.18, here means the driver of a beast,
the Arab. cognate of the Heb. verb being used to describe the beating of game.
8. tr means perhaps scours; cf. ane trm, travellers or itinerant
merchants in 1 Kgs 10.15, but the parallel with dra indicates the meaning
spies out, as in the reconnaissance of Palestine in Num. 10.32; 13.12, 16ff.;
14.6; cf. Judg. 1.23 (so Theod., T, V).
9. The verb h is emphatic, expressing willing consent.
rm is spelled rem in Deut. 33.17, which is more usual. Aq, LXX and V
render rhinoceros, hence AV unicorn. Deuteronomy 33.17 indicates that a
two-horned beast is indicated, the wild-ox, which, unlike the rhinoceros, was
found in western Asia in historical times. The killing of one rmu in Syria was
considered sufcient of an exploit to be noted by Tiglath-pileser, an indication
of the rarity and ferocity of the beast. A variant of the noun may be Ugaritic
rim. The strength and ferocity of the beast is proverbial in Num. 23.22; 24.8;
Pss. 22.22 (EVV 21); 29.6. It is suggested that the conception of the unicorn
arose from the representation of the animal with its horns in prole, as on the
Ishtar Gate at Babylon (ANEP, pl. 760; Godbey 1939). s (manger) is
comparatively rare in the OT; cf. Isa. 1.3; Prov. 14.4.
10. The repetition of rem in v. 10a is doubtful and we follow LXX in reading
nr (yoke), assuming scribal corruption of n to m and y to in the Old Heb.
script and metathesis, reading hatiqr nr. We suspect also MT a, which
LXX understood as ropes (cf. Isa. 5.18), also in association with yoke. The
pronominal sufx suggests rather that a is singular, the verbal noun of
h (to be thick), giving a reading haiqr nr baa (Will you bind a
yoke on his massive bulk?). We would explain be as misplaced in MT after
elem, a gloss on an Aram. word for furrow in v. 10b.
Both LXX and 11QtargJob understood yeaddd not as harrowing,
unknown until comparatively recently in Palestine (Dalman 1932: II, 189-91)
but as ploughing. The verb is found only here and in Isa. 28.24 and Hos.
10.11, being associated with ploughing in both passages. The verb may be
cognate with Arab. adda (to be straight), hence in the IInd Form to make
straight, an apt predicate of an object furrows, which we would nd in the
Aram. ar, of which we suggest that MT aar (after you), quite the
opposite of ploughing, was a scribal corruption. This word (cf. Syr. rat, to
spit, Ugar. rt, to score), we suggest, was that on which MT elem in v. 10a,
found here neither in LXX nor the Qumran targum, was a gloss. Thus for v.
10b we propose the reading im-yeadd bmeq ar (Will he draw
your furrows straight in the plain?).
474
11. In v. 11b yee is ambiguous, meaning primarily labour, and secondarily that for which one labours. The former sense might be supported by
the parallel colon v. 11a, the reliance of the farmer on his beast for the
preparation of the crop being emphasized. The colon, on the other hand, might
be taken with what follows, in which case yea would refer to the produce,
the corn to be brought in to the threshing-oor and threshed by the beast.
12. In v. 12a we prefer the Kethib ya to Qere y, and in v. 12b we read
the locative gornh (to the threshing-oor) for MT weorne.
13. The passage vv. 13-18 is a crux interpretum, vv. 14-18 being noticed in
Origens Hexapla as lacking in the original LXX, which was then supplemented
from the original of Theodotions translation. The transliterations of neelsh,
ash and wenh of MT in LXX, S and A, which probably also derived
from Theodotions translation, attest the Heb. text, but indicate a failure to
understand it. The same may be said of the phrase pteryx terpomenon (the
wing of the joyful ones), which is a literalism with no attempt to understand
the meaning in the context, like the wing of those who praise of Aq, S and T.
None of the versions understands neelsh, which is a Niphal participle. Aq,
V and T, however, understand ash and nh as respectively stork (cf.
Lev. 11.19; Ps. 104.17; Jer. 8.7; Zech. 5.9) and hawk (cf. n, Lev. 11.16).
erh caused some trouble to translators, and is omitted in Aq. Sym understands ash as stork, but takes nh as feathers, which is possible (cf.
Ezek. 17.3 and Ass. n, cited by Dhorme), and renders im-erh as if (the
stork hugs its) feathers or possibly does (the stork hug its) feathers?, which
is another unintelligible literalism. From the few reliable hints of the versions,
translations and interpretation of modern commentators have been many and
various, and none quite convincing. The sequel makes it certain that the
ostrich is described (so V), which suggests the emendation of rennm to
yenm. The speed of the ostrich on the ground (v. 18) contrasts with its
inability to use its wings to y. This has suggested that erh means wing,
which is possible, especially as kena stands in the parallel position in v. 13a;
and it is so taken by Dhorme, whose translation may be cited as illustrative of
the attempt to preserve the conventional meaning of MT, and as the basis of
our reinterpretation:
The wing of the ostrich is joyous,
(The ostrich) is the possessor of a graceful wing and plumage.
Here Dhorme takes las in neelsh as a byform of la or laz, and points
MT im as m (lit. mother), which introduces a conspicuous feature in a
nickname, as in Arabic. The rendering of erh ash as graceful wing is
scarcely felicitous, since s denotes a moral and not a physical quality. If
instead of Dhormes graceful we admit the meaning of ash as stork
with Aq, V and T, MT nh would have to be pointed nh, meaning hawk,
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The Book of Job
475
as those versions understood. Verse 14, however, raises a difculty, the

conjunction k introducing the theme of the callousness and stupidity of the
ostrich in leaving her eggs to hatch in the sand at the mercy of the feet of wild
beasts. This suggests either that a passage has dropped out or that v. 13 is
corrupt. Van Hoonacker (1913: 420ff.) proposed to read for MT im erh
ash, merh ash (a mother who has lost all tenderness), which
would admirably introduce the sequel. In this case, however, MT nh would
have to be explained either as an intrusion, perhaps a dittograph of bh in
v. 14 or rather a corruption of lnea.
Hence after van Hoonacker the following reconstruction is possible:
kena yenh neelzh
m erh ash lnea

A mother who has quite lost all tenderness.
While agreeing with the sequel, however, this reconstruction of v. 13b has
no relation to v. 13a. We suggest that the meaning of the passage has been
bedevilled by the scribal error, through dictation, of im for im as the preposition of comparison, and of the misunderstanding of neelsh, a corruption or
the Heb. rendering of an Arab. alaza, to be weak (so Guillaume 1963: 125).
Guillaume proposed the rendering:
Is the wing of the ostrich weak,
Or strong like the stork or the hawk?
Guillaume takes Heb. erh as a verb erh; cf. the adjective abbr (the
strong one, 24.22; 34.20; 1 Sam. 21.8; Judg. 5.22; Isa. 46.12; etc.). The great
difculty here is the want of a preposition of comparison before the stork and
the hawk. This suggests a modication, which is in our opinion more feasible:
kena yenh neelzh
im-era ash wenh

In comparison with the wing of the stork and
the hawk.
In the various passages on the beasts the emphasis is laid on one characteristic.
Here without doubt it is the speed of the ostrich that contrasts so strongly with
the weakness of its wings. This suggests that v. 13 was originally followed by
v. 18 and that vv. 14-17 was a later expansion, possibly from a passage which
described the traditional characteristic of the ostrich abandoning her clutch and
even her young. Fohrer (1989: 514f.) explains the source of the tradition as the
habit of the ostrich of laying an egg every two days and covering the clutch
with sand for protection against the strong sun until it is ready for normal
incubation, while its abandoning of its young is through self-preservation and
reliance on its speed, possibly to distract whatever threatens, as our native
game birds which feign a broken wing. rennm is a hapax legomenon in the
OT, hence the emendation yenm proposed by Hoffmann (so Budde, Duhm
et al.); cf. Lam. 4.3; Job 30.29, ben yaanh (lit. daughters of greed),
referring to the voracious and rough feeding of the ostrich. Fohrer (1989),
retaining MT rennim, refers to the raucous cries of the bird.
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The hawk (nh) is attested in the masc. in v. 26, where the reference is
probably to its migration. This would suit the reference to the stork, the
endurance of both migrants of the wing contrasting very strongly with the
weakness of the wing of the ostrich, which cannot even y.
14. The parallelism with taaz in v. 14a suggests that tannm (leaves
them) may be read for MT teammm (incubates them). Tur-Sinai may be
near the truth in seeing in teammm the intensive form of an Aram. verb
amh (to neglect).
15. zr is used of wringing out uid, for example water from a eece (Judg.
6.3, 8), so here of breaking eggs. d is used of threshing in Amos 1.3,
originally done by the trampling of animals.
16. q is used in the OT only here and at Isa. 63.17. Its meaning to be
hard, harsh is in no doubt; cf. Arab. qaaa (to be rm, hard, tough).
Her toil (yeh) is the laying of the eggs.
She has no fear (MT bel-a) is strange and unexpected, and is barely
explicable in the sense without anxiety; for which paa (terror) is too
strong. In spite of the unanimous support of the versions we would question
MT, proposing either pera (cf. Arab. faru[n]) either as the verbal noun
hatching or as chick, or that paa is used here in the sense of kin (cf.
Albright 1957: 248).
18. In MT k bammrm tamr the ancient versions attest MT, but differ in
interpretation, largely owing to unfamiliarity with tamr. Dhorme attempts to
support MT in assuming that the sense of to rise up is the primary sense from
which mrh (to rebel) was developed. But to argue back from mrh (to
rebel) to the assumed sense of an unknown verb is questionable philology.
The verb has been connected with Arab. mara(y) (to beat), either the air with
the wings by the ostrich when running (so Hlscher, G.B. Gray, Kissane,
Mowinckel, Fohrer), or the beating of the ground with the feet. In the latter
case bammrm would require emendation; hence Hitzig and Duhm proposed
k bemr tamr (when occasion arises in running she stamps the
ground), which implies only the scribal error of m for s in MT bammarm in
the Old Heb. script. Certainly the implication in v. 18b suggests some reference to running in v. 18a, though we may still doubt the meaning proposed for
tamr. Tur-Sinai and Pope after Wetzstein read MT and assume a technical
hunting term in tamr, referring to the spreading of the tail-feathers of the
ostrich in running; they cite in support for Wetzstein a passage from the Arab
poet Rashid (see Pope). In support of this interpretation, Tur-Sinai adduces the
noun murh in Lev. 1.16, which refers to the rump of a sacricial pigeon,
which is taken off with the tail-feathers and thrown away as refuse. The
connection at the verb tamr with murh would admirably explain the Hiphil
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477
of the verb, which would thus be denominative. Another possible reading

which may be admitted is that of Wright and Budde, ke b mrm for MT
k bammrm, meaning when the archers come. We should still prefer
Tur-Sinais interpretation of tamr with the emendation of bammrm to
bemr. The merit of the reading of Wright and Budde is that it gives the
occasion of the running of the ostrich, and offers a concrete picture in parallelism with the horse and his rider, which the running of the ostrich implies.
The whole point of the passage, however, demands a more explicit reference
to running, and so we prefer the reading of Hitzig and Duhm, with Tur-Sinais
interpretation of tamr. A propos of v. 18b, Xenophon (Anabasis 1.5.2) cites
an actual case where ostriches outstripped horses. For this whole passage Pope
has assembled interesting and informative data, both scientic and popular, on
the habits of the ostrich.
19. The conception of the clothing of the horses neck with thunder, MT raam
(so AV), is highly poetical, but philologically absurd since raam denotes
strictly the noise of the thunder. Theod., Jerome in his commentary and V, as
well as certain modern commentators, take this as a reference to neighing, but
in this case the verb clothe is not appropriate.
The concealed word is obviously mane, for which LXX has phobos (fear),
a corruption of an original phob (mane). The word in this sense is a hapax
legomenon in the OT, from which an analogy is adduced from Arab. umm
rimi(n) (mother of a mane), that is, a hyena (so Koehler and Baumgartner
1952).
20. The verb ra means generally to quake or quiver; in v. 24 it describes
the vibration of the hurtling javelin. In Nah. 3.2 it describes the violent motion
of chariot-wheels; cf. Jer. 10.22; 47.3, where it evidently describes the rattling
chariots, and Job 41.21, where it describes the hurtling of a spear. As expressing both motion and sound, we opt for the translation of tarenn (send him
hurtling on his course). The comparison of the chariot- or cavalry-charge to
locusts (here probably collective singular) is probably an adaptation of the
comparison of locusts to a chariot- or cavalry-charge in Joel 2.4ff., where the
comparison is in respect of motion as well as sound. In the present passage the
point of comparison may be the irresistible onward charge of the warhorse.
21. MT yaper might be intelligible, meaning digs, but it is probably better
emended to yapr and taken as a denominative Hiphil of a verb cognate with
Arab. ru(n) (hoof), cited by G.B. Gray.
bmeq is ambiguous. It might denote an open valley, or plain, most suitable for the movement of chariotry or cavalry; cf. Isa. 22.7, your choicest
valleys were full of chariots. But as in Akk. and Ugar. the word may also
mean power, or violence. Pope cites Jer. 47.5 as an instance of this meaning of meq in Heb., but this is doubtful evidence in view of the LXX reading
1
478
anqm for MT imqm, that is, the remnant of the Anakim associated with the
Philistine country; cf. Josh. 11.22.
We would omit we in MT wey, which we take as an imperfect of
attendant circumstances, as in Arabic, arranging the text:
yapr bmeq y
bea y liqra-neq
He paws in the plain, exultant,

In strength he goes out to meet the weapons.
23. The spear and the javelin in v. 21b indicate that the quiver (aph)
denotes really the contents of the quiver. This is supported by the verb trnn
(MT tirneh), which is cognate with Arab. ranna (to twang, e.g. of a bowstring). The spelling with nal h suggests that the verb should be pointed
trnnh, with energic ending as in Prov. 1.20; 8.3 (so Dahood 1963c: 4).
laha in v. 23b denotes both ames and ashing of bright metal, as in the
aming sword in Gen. 3.24 (AV). In a context similar to the present one, in
Nah. 3.3 laha ere denotes the ashing sword.
24. On raa, here quivering, as suggested by the association with rez
(agitation), see on v. 20. The verb gm is attested in the OT only here and
in Gen. 24.17: hamn-n mea-mayim (Let me swallow a little water).
The gure is illustrated by Bochart from Arab. poetry iltaama lfarau
larata (horse ate up the ground).
Verse 24b has been deemed unduly difcult through the failure to recognize
the exceptive force of k. LXX and V understood yaamn as believe and took
the verse to mean that so eager was the horse for battle that it could not believe
its ears when the trumpet sounded. A way out was sought by Gesenius, Ewald
and most moderns by taking the verb in the sense of standing rm, he stands
still no longer at the sound of the trumpet (so G.B. Gray, Mowinckel [with
reserve], Fohrer, Pope, Guillaume). But in this case the verb would surely be
Niphal and not Hiphil, as in Isa. 9.9; 22.23, 25. Duhm doubted the condition of
the text and conjectured l ymn wel yamel (and he turns not right or
left) (so Hlscher), which admittedly gives a better parallel, though
graphically MT is not a likely corruption of this text, and the versions give no
support. We should read yaamn and beql for MT ql, and, taking k in the
exceptive sense, render his whole trust is in the sound of the trumpet.
25. According to his tendency in the case of an apparent tricolon, Hlscher
assumes the loss of a colon from an original statement in bicola, here between
vv. 24b and 25a, and Fohrer assumes the loss of a colon between v. 25a and b.
The poet, like those in the Ras Shamra myths and legends, however, varies the
monotony of bicola by an occasional tricolon, which has often the effect of
punctuation, ending a subject or a period. Here we would retain the tricolon as
ending the passage on the warhorse. In the passage on wild beasts beyond
human control and convenience that on the warhorse is exceptional. It is
suggested in its present position by the comparison of the ostrich with the
1
The Book of Job
479
steed in v. 18. In accordance with the theme of the context, the poet, who
obviously warms to his subject, cites the reckless courage of the warhorse as a
phenomenon unexpected from a creature usually so docile. In the time of the
author of the Book of Job, however, the horse was used almost solely in war.
be is pointed as if it meant insufciency, which would rather be midd
(in proportion to, as often as). We propose to read beya (to the accompaniment of); cf. al-ye kel dw (to the accompaniment of Davids
instruments, 2 Chron. 29.27; cf. Amos 6.5). h is an exclamation of satisfaction (Isa. 44.16; Ezek. 25.3; 26.2; etc.). terh is used of the triumphant
and condent war-cry, as in Amos 1.14.
26. On the evidence of Thomson (1860: 326) this is taken as a reference to two
migrant birds. pra kn is found parallel to dh (to y) in Jer. 48.40
and 49.22.
27-30. MT in this passage refers to another bird, neer, which meant both eagle
and vulture, to the latter of which vv. 29-30 would be particularly appropriate.
In v. 27 Duhm would excise yagbah ner we and in v. 28 sela yikn, as
suggested by LXX, and meh in v. 28b, as inserted by an editor who
remembered the passage on the vulture (neer) in Jer. 49.16. Duhm would
arrange the remaining text thus:
im al-p yrm qinn
weyilnn al-n sela
mim ar-kel.
The reference to carrion, which the vulture detects from an apparently

impossible distance (vv. 29-30; cf. Mt. 24.28; Lk. 17.37) suggests the references in MT to the vulture, which, rather than the hawk, feeds on carrion. In
MT we is awkward, but the text may be restored thanks to 11QtargJob which
read z, a certain kind of eagle, for MT we. This suggests to us kr,
which denotes a falcon in 15.24; cf. Syr. kawdr. On this reading scribal
corruption occurred through the omission of dr of kr before yr in yrm and
dittography of w after r in the Old Heb. script.
28. en-sela (lit. tooth of rock) is used of an isolated crag in 1 Sam. 14.4.
29. ar is used of the reconnaissance of the land by the spies sent out by
Moses from Sinai (Deut. 1.22; cf. Josh. 2.3).
30. eryw (for MT erhw) is attested in this form in Deut. 22.6 and Ps.
84.4; cf. our proposed reading pera in v. 16b. Formally MT yeale from
la, unattested in the OT, with no apparent cognate, may be suspected. Aq,
Sym and S imply the reading yelale from la, possibly an Aramaic form of
lqaq (to lap or gulp up, Judg. 7.5); cf. MT wel in Obad. 16.
1
480
40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-6), displaced in MT to after 40.24. See the Introduction to

chs. 3341.
40.25ff. This section is defective in LXX, which omits 40.26a, 31a; 41.4, 8a,
15b, 18b, 21a, 24b. On the peculiarities of LXX see the General Introduction.
25. On Leviathan, primarily the mythical marine monster of primaeval chaos,
ltn of the Ras Shamra texts, cf. Job 3.8; Isa. 27.1. Here the natural crocodile is
denoted as a force defying the skill or power of humans; see on vv. 14ff. The
verb tim is probably chosen to evoke the Egyptian word for crocodile,
which survives in Coptic temsa.
MT beeel taqa len has caused commentators a good deal of trouble.
The verb is familiar in Classical Heb. in the Qal, meaning to sink down; see
on v. 23. Press down his tongue with a line (G.B. Gray, Hlscher, Kissane,
Mowinckel, Fohrer, Pope) might refer to the effect of a hook in the throat, but
is not a natural expression conjuring up any obvious image. Nor does it help
to render will you bind his tongue with a line? as Michaelis suggested
following Aq, Theod. and V and citing qa (to bind) in a Samaritan text on
Lev. 8.13 (so Dhorme, Terrien). This does not correspond to shing technique,
which the parallel colon seems to demand. The same might be said of Balls
rendering will you bind cords on his teeth?. This, however, does suggest part
of the solution, to get rid of the awkward reference to tongue (len) by
reading al-innyw. Actually there is a verb aqa(y) in Arab. (to vie with),
the cognate of which may be read here, allowing of MT taqa to be attached
to l so reading al-innyw; hence our reading eeel tiqeh al-innyw (or
contend with him with a line despite his teeth?).
26. The reference in v. 26b to boring the beasts cheek with a hook (a) is
misleading. In the OT a is never used of a sh-hook, but of a hook (cf.
a) which Assyrian captors inserted in the cheeks of their captives (2 Chron.
33.11) (e.g. ANEP, pls. 296, 447; 2 Kgs 19.23; Isa. 37.29; Ezek. 19.4, 9; 29.4;
38.4). Ezekiel 29.4 refers to the treatment of Egypt guratively described as
the monster tannn (MT tannm), tnn, one of the primaeval monsters in the Baal
myth of Ras Shamra, but here particularized as the crocodile of the Nile.
Indeed this passage may well have suggested the equation of Leviathan in Job
with the crocodile. In any case the gure has changed in v. 26 from that of
angling to that of captivity.
agmn in the OT means rushes or a marsh (Isa. 9.12; 19.15; 58.5). The
reference can hardly be to a rope or halter of rushes, poor material surely for
holding so strong a creature. So we welcome the interpretation of 11QtargJob,
which reads zmm for MT agmn (cf. Syr. and Arab. zamm [bridle]), which
would give excellent sense in the context. Assuming mythological overtones,
Pope suggests a reection of the muzzling of the primaeval monsters of Chaos,
for example, Mummu in the Babylonian Enuma Elish (ANET, 6.72) and of tnn
1
The Book of Job
481
in the Ras Shamra texts (Gordon, UT III, 37). See further, General Introduction, Text and Versions, p. 85.
28. The reference to covenant may indicate not vassal-treaties, as those of
Hittite and Assyrian kings, which were imposed by the suzerain, but rather, as
late as the time of the composition of the Book of Job and its addenda, the
contract whereby an ibr slave who had mortgaged his freedom had the option
of release in the seventh year or perpetual servitude (Exod. 21.2-6).
29. The conception of Leviathan as a play-thing for children is a variant of
that of Gods making of Leviathan for sport (Ps. 104.26), the supreme
assertion of condent monotheism in so relegating the traditional rival to
Gods Order (Kaiser 1962).
30. The verb yireh here must mean seek to buy, hence haggle over. The
verb is attested in Dan. 2.6, and, possibly in the sense of hire, in Hos. 3.2; cf.
Arab. kara(y) in the Vth Form (to hire). MT arm seems more than associates, the regular meaning of the noun in Classical Heb. Tur-Sinai is surely
right in connecting it with Akk. bt eber (warehouse). In this case MT
arm may thus be pointed as a noun denoting a vocation, abbrm
(wholesale merchants), who buy provisions in bulk and sell them to retailers
(kenaanm). The latter term, originally denoting traders in purple (kinau),
for which the Phoenician coast was famous and after which it was named
kinana (Canaan), dealers in cloth to dye (Prov. 31.24) came to have a generic
signicance as merchants. The verb h is used of dividing a carcass in
Exod. 21.35.
Job 40.2, 7-14

THE DIVINE DECLARATION: CONCLUSION
Jobs declaration that he will say no more (vv. 3-5) is belied by his declaration
in 42.2-6, to which it should be transposed after the poems on Behemoth
(40.15-24) and Leviathan (40.2541.26 [EVV ch. 41]), which are later
insertions in the Book. Verse 6 (And God answered Job from a tempest and
said) is probably a gloss after 38.1 occasioned by the misplacement of vv. 35. Verse 1 (And Yahweh answered Job and said) has no point in the present
text, since Job has not yet spoken in reply to Gods questions in chs. 3839. It
is thus a gloss reecting 38.1, a conclusion supported by its omission from
LXX and one Heb. MS. Verse 7, which has also been suspected as a gloss after
38.3, may simply resume the challenge of God after the long declaration on
Gods sovereignty in nature. Introducing Gods questioning of Jobs challenge
of divine justice in vv. 8-14 in forensic idiom, it is particularly appropriate.
On the division into two strophes (vv. 2, 7-9 and 10-14) and their style and
content see above, p. 453.
Chapter 40.2, 7-14
2.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
Will he who contends1 with God yield?2

And he who argues with God? Let him answer.
Brace yourself like a man. I will ask and do you inform me.
Will you indeed disrupt my Order,
Convicting me to acquit you?
Have you an arm like Gods?
And with a voice like his can you thunder?
Pray deck yourself with pride and exaltation,
And put on glory and splendour.
Pour forth the spate of your anger,
And lay low every haughty man3 you see.
If you see any proud man abase him,
And pull down the wicked from their place;4
Hide them in the dust together,
Imprison their persons in the lowly ground.
And I will render you praise,
That your right hand has wrought deliverance for you.
The Book of Job
483
Textual Notes to Chapter 40.2, 7-14

1.
2.
3.
4.
Reading har for MT har. See Commentary ad loc.

Reading ysr with Theod. and V for MT yissr.
Reading weah for MT eh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading mittatm for MT tatm, m being omitted by haplography after the
previous word.
Commentary on Chapter 40.2, 7-14

2. MT rb has been taken as an innitive absolute (so Fohrer), which is formally possible, but, we consider, unlikely. The whole couplet in MT is formally
possible, yissr being taken as a noun, a fault-nder (so Merx, Dillmann,
Siegfried, Budde, Duhm, G.B. Gray, Peake, Fohrer). The parallelism, however, indicates an imperfect, as Theod. and V indicate, reading evidently ysr
(turn aside, give way). Sym., T and V read the participle r for MT r,
which is more likely as a parallel to ma in v. 2b (so Michaelis, Hoffmann,
Tur-Sinai, Ball, Dhorme, Hlscher, Kissane, Mowinckel, Pope, Terrien). We
take yaanennh as jussive, with the energic ending, familiar in Ugar. and
Arab.
7. On the gure, see on 38.3.
8-14. Having exposed the inadequacy of humans to divine Gods ultimate
purpose and to match his ordering of natural phenomena, God exposes the
inadequacy of humans to maintain moral order in society, which is more
immediately relevant to Jobs case; so Eissfeldt (1965: 459) emphasized, nding
that passage, with Jobs reply in 42.1-6, more closely linked with the theme of
the dialogue than with anything else in the Divine Declaration. The argument
from the theme of Gods Order (mip) in nature to his sovereignty and Order
in society, with dire consequences to all, even in Israel, who militated against
Gods Order, had been the dominating theme of Amos and Isaiah of Jerusalem.
8. haa asks an indignant rhetorical question, usually on a preposterous proposition, as here. The verb prar (lit. to speak, interrupt) in the Hiphil is used in
the sense of frustrating or nullifying, for example, the nullifying of Ahithophels counsel (2 Sam. 15.34; 17.14), and it is regularly used of breaking the
covenant, the expression of Gods Order (mip) in society. The forensic
language of v. 8b might indicate, alternatively, the rendering thwart my just
case; cf. tarn (convict me, lit. make me wrong) and tidq (acquit
yourself lit. be right).
9. As often in Heb., an abstract quality is symbolized by a particular bodily
member. So arm is used for power, as in Exod. 15.16; Isa. 40.10; 51.5; etc.
1
484
Job 40.2, 7-14. The Divine Declaration: Conclusion
The mention of thunder evokes the theme of the New Year festival, the Kingship
of God in what we regard as its original setting in the great seasonal festival at
the turn of the year in late autumn, as in ancient Canaan, to which the Baal myth
of Ras Shamra was relevant. Here the theme was the revival and epiphany of
Baal-Hadad as king, whose ascendancy was signalized by thunder as the herald
of the winter rains. With the sober theme of the triumph of cosmos over chaos
the Canaanite liturgy was adapted in the liturgy of the New Year festival in
Israel (Kapelrud 1940; J. Gray 1956; 1961).
10. ah means put on adornment (e.g. Isa. 61.10; Jer. 31.4; Ezek. 16.11; etc.);
cf. a adornment (2 Sam. 1.24).
Verse 10a recalls h wehr lt in Ps. 104.1, which refers to the
characteristic vestments of God. This is contrasted with pride (gn) and
exaltation (gah), human presumption.
11. erh means overow, excess, derived from the verb ar, which is
used of a river overowing its banks. It denotes human arrogance (zdn) in
Prov. 21.24 and rage of humans (Gen. 49.7; Amos 1.11) and of God (Isa. 14.6;
Zeph. 1.16, dies irae; etc.). Job is challenged to match effectively the just
wrath of God beyond his own presumption and incontrollable anger, evinced
in his indignant outbursts in the Dialogue. In v. 11b LXX omits reh, in
which case its insertion would be under the inuence of reh in v. 12a. We
prefer, however, to retain MT, seeing in the repetition of reh Gods ironical
challenge to Job to quell presumption by a look. It is unlikely that geh
should be repeated in vv. 11b and 12a, and we suggest the emendation gah
for MT geh in v. 11b. This is more suitable with hapl in v. 11b than with
hana in v. 12a, where Duhm after LXX proposed the same emendation; cf.
Isa. 5.15 (n gehm tipalnh); 10.33 (haggehm yipel); but cf. Isa.
13.11, gaawa arm apl. In vv. 11b and 12a reh is the imperative in the
conditional sense, the so-called hypothetical imperative, akin to the jussive in
the protasis without a conditional particle; cf. GKC, 159d.
12. ha is a hapax legomenon, for which Dhorme cites the Arab. cognate
hadaka (to pull down).
tatm (in their place, i.e. possibly in respect to their place) might be an
adverbial accusative, but may better be emended to mittatm (from their
place), assuming haplography of m after the previous word rem.
13. ba in parallelism with man (to hide) must be cognate with Arab.
abaa (to conne); cf. abu(n) (prison). We should nd a word-play
between man (to hide) in v. 13a and mn in v. 13b, which, as parallel
with pr, must be cognate with Arab. muminu(n) (at, or depressed,
ground).
1
Job 40.3-5; 42.2-6

JOBS SUBMISSION
Jobs submission in two strophes (40.3-5; 42.2-3, 5-6) corresponds partly to
the forensic tradition, where a litigant cedes his case, especially in 40.3-5, and
partly to the response of the subject to the reassuring oracle in the Plaint of the
Sufferer, especially in 42.2-3. There Job emerges from doubt to certainty,
declared in the introductory yat (I know; cf. Pss. 20.7 [EVV 6]; 140.13
[EVV 12]), assured by the evidences of Gods omnipotence and positive purpose (42.2) in the Divine Declaration, which corresponds to the oracle in the
Plaint of the Sufferer. In this new dimension Job admits that his arguments for
his personal case in the Dialogue have been inadequate. In the nal strophe,
after the acceptance of the revelation of the living God (now my eye has seen
you), in the convention of the Plaint of the Sufferer Job nally emphasizes his
submission and due repentance for his challenge of the divine economy (v. 6).
Jobs nal response to God in all humility is quickened by the signicant
encouragement of the personal experience of God who has condescended to
address him (v. 5) and ipso facto has assured him that he is neither forgotten
nor treated with indifference.
In this section 42.4 seems to be contradicted by Jobs statement that he will
say no more (40.5), and we treat it as Jobs confession of his presumption in
questioning God, quoting Gods challenge to him in 38.3b and 40.7b, thus
admitting that in communication between God and humans the initiative is
with God and the human part is strictly response.
Chapters 40.3-5; 42.2-6
40.3.
And Job answered Yahweh and said:
4.
Lo, I am too insignicant to answer you;1

I have put my hand to my mouth;
I have said one thing and will not repeat it,2
Yea, two, and will say no more.
5.
42.2.
3.
I know (for certain) that you are omnipotent

And there is no purpose beyond you.
Who is this that obscures (your) purpose
With words3 without knowledge?
So I declared without understanding
Things too wonderful for me that I did not know, (saying),
486
4.
5.
6.
Job 40.3-5; 42.2-6. Jobs Submission

Hear, I pray you, and I will speak,
I shall question you, and do you inform me.
As the ear hears I had heard of you,
But now my eye has seen you.
Wherefore I demean myself and yield,4
Reduced5 to dust and ashes.
Textual Notes to Chapters 40.3.5; 42.2-6

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Reading mhae for MT mh ae.

Reading eneh for MT eeneh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading bemillm with LXX, S and one Heb. MS, completing the citation of 38.2.
Reading al-kn emms weemmas, following LXX and 11QtargJob. See Commentary ad loc. and the General Introduction, Text and Versions, pp. 76-91.
Reading wenimh in colon b for weniamt in colon a of MT after 11QtargJob. See
Commentary ad loc. and the General Introduction, Text and Versions, p. 76.
Commentary on Chapters 40.3-5 and 42.2-6

On the unity of this passage on Jobs submission, broken up after the secondary insertion on Behemoth and Leviathan, with consequent adjustment in the
insertion of 42.1, see the General Introduction (p. 35).
40.4. We adopt Ehrlichs emendation mhae for MT mh ae, the
innitive construct Hiphil with the comparative min, which gives a smoother
reading than MT. qal is used here in the primary sense to be light. In the Piel
it means to curse, lit. to make light, to divest of weight or substance (k,
lit. weight). It denotes here someone conscious of his own insignicance.
The hand upon the mouth indicates both silence and deference to a superior;
cf. the worshipper before a god in Mesopotamian sculpture, for example
Hammurabi before the sun-god on the famous stele with his code of laws
(ANEP, pl. 246); and cf. the Legend of King Krt in the Ras Shamra texts
(Gordon, UT 125, 41-42):
q apk byd (b)r(l)tk bm ymn
Hold thy hand over thy nose, thy right hand

over my throat.
The gesture may signify the acknowledgment that the very breath of life
depended on the grace of the superior. On the other hand B. Couroyer (1960)
adduces the gesture in forensic convention that a litigant has no more to say.
5. The parallelism indicates the reading eneh for MT eeneh, though eeneh
is not unintelligible in the sense to speak up again. But after aa dibbart
the number two is expected in the convention of numerical climax noting
multitude, frequency or repetition in epic convention and wisdom literature.
1
The Book of Job
487
42.2. In Jobs nal submission the recurrence of the verb ya is to be noted,
denoting at once Jobs insufcient knowledge of the whole range and
signicance of the divine economy (v. 3b, d), of which he had been convicted
in the Divine Declaration (38.2, 4-5, 18, 21; 39.1-2), and the rm conviction
to which he has now attained of what faith had asserted regarding the nature
and will of God (v. 2). The verb in the latter sense in Jobs submission corresponds signicantly to the recurrence of ya in the moment of assurance, or
anticipation of the plea of the sufferer being heard, as Fohrer (1989: 532) has
well noted at, e.g., Pss. 41.12 (EVV 11); 54.10 (EVV 9); 141.13 (EVV 12).
Verse 2b is Jobs quotation from Gods challenge from 38.2 in the introduction to marvels beyond marvels, which convinces Job that in questioning
the divine economy he is ultra vires. In v. 2b MT wel-yibbr mimme
mezimmh, mezimmh may be supported against the proposal to read memh
(so Hoffmann, Graetz, Beer after LXX) by Gen. 11.6, l yibbr mhem kolaer yzem (read yzmm). The verb bar is attested in the sense to make
inaccessible, e.g. r mibr (fortied city, lit. cut off by escarpment and
high walls). mezimmh (purpose; see on 21.17) is considered as an objective
to which access is barred, though not by God. Lvque has noticed (1970:
524) that besides this passage mezimmh is applied to God only thrice (Jer.
33.30; 30.24; 51.11), always in reference to Gods retributive purpose, contrasting the sinister contrivance and purpose of the wicked. Here the purpose
of God is more positive.
3. We regard v. 3ab as Jobs citation of Gods indignant question in 38.2, m
zeh maa h bemillm bel-aa, indicating that bemillm should be read
in 42.3b after LXX, which the metre demands. nipl mimmenn recalls the
statement of the suppliant who declares his faith in Ps. 131.1. nil denotes
the immediate activity of God in which he gives no evidence of secondary
causes by which humans can reason from natural cause to effect independent
of the power of God.
4. On the signicance of this verse recalling Gods challenge in 40.7b, see the
introduction to this section.
5. There is no reason to believe, as Tur-Sinai suggests, that weatth n
ree indicates the source of the Book. The verb here, as frequently in
Arab., denotes mental as well as physical perception. n in this context
emphasizes actual experience without specifying its actual nature beyond
Jobs rm conviction as the result of his appreciation of the evidence of Gods
activity and providence. The full import of the verb rh in Jobs declaration
is conveyed by the experience of Isaiah of Jerusalem, who declares, With my
eyes I have seen the King, the Lord of Hosts (Isa. 6.5). The prophet expresses
at once his dread of the presence of the living God, his debasement, and his
full realization of the divine nature and will, which it is now his imperative
1
488
Job 40.3-5; 42.2-6. Jobs Submission
duty to proclaim. The assurance of the efcacy of the living God in all
contingencies and the security of his fellowship is expressed in Ps. 34.9 (EVV
8): Taste and see that the Lord is good; happy the one who nds refuge in
him. Here Job contrasts the conventional assertions about God based on the
traditions of his society and accepted theologoumena with the personal
experience of God. The contrast is between theology and religion. His
declaration signicantly echoes his assurance of vindication, nay rh (MT
r) in 19.27. See above ad loc.
6. MT emas without an object has suggested to LXX, S and V that the verb
was reexive emms. LXX gives a double interpretation, I demean myself
(emms) and I melt (emmas), so NEB. It has been proposed to take MT
emas as I reject, understanding my case or my words as the object of the
transitive verb (so G.B. Gray, Mowinckel, Fohrer, Pope, Kuyper 1959: 91-94),
which might be supported by MT weniamt. If this verb, contrary to MT, is
taken with colon b it would indicate the utter submission and deepest
humiliation of Job on dust and ashes. But under stylistic and metrical
considerations and after LXX and 11QtargJob we read:
al-kn emms weemmas
wenimh al-r weer
Therefore I demean myself and yield,
And am reduced to dust and ashes.
For a detailed justication of this text and translation, see the General
Introduction, Text and Versions (pp. 86-87). We note the word-play so
characteristic of the Book of Job in emms weemmas and r weer.
Job 40.1541.26 (EVV 34)

WISDOM POEMS ON NATURAL THEMES
Job 40.1541.26 contains Poems on the Beast (Behemoth), the Hippopotamus (40.15-24, 31-32; 41.1-3 [EVV 40.15-24; 41.7-11]) and the Crocodile
(Leviathan) (40.25-30; 41.4-26 [EVV 41.1-6, 12-34]). The latter is a composite
work of two poems (40.25-30 [EVV 41.1-6], and 41.4-26 [EVV 12-34]), 40.2530 being drafted in MT from after 39.30 and subsequently expanded.
These are wisdom poems on natural themes, descriptive of characteristic
features of natural phenomena like the shorter passages on the wild creatures
in ch. 39, to which 40.25-30 belongs, and like them emphasizing the untameable nature and extraordinary strength and ferocity of the hippopotamus and
the crocodile, which has made their hunting by humans a most dangerous
enterprise, if not indeed, as in the second poem on the crocodile (41.4-26 [EVV
12-34]), impossible. They probably belonged to the same category of encyclopaedic work as the passages in ch. 39, and were added later to the Book of Job
by one familiar with such a work. In spite of the lengthy and detailed description of the two great beasts, which digresses from the main point, the representation of two such formidable forces defying human power, and even,
perhaps, as symbols of the powers of chaos defying God, would have been a
ne climax to the list of beasts in ch. 39, as Richter has maintained (1958a: 520). The citation of the passages on the various beasts in ch. 39; 40.25-30,
however, culminates in the conclusion to the Divine Declaration in 40.2, 7-14,
after which the passages on the hippopotamus and the crocodile in 41.4-26
(EVV 12-34) are probably an addition, differing markedly from the shorter,
more pointed passages on the other beasts in ch. 39 except for the passage on
the horse (39.19-25) and possibly the expansion on the ostrich (39.14-17).
H.H. Schmid (1966: 183n) regards Behemoth and Leviathan as mythological
on the grounds that the names never signify the hippopotamus and the
crocodile elsewhere in the OT, whereas Behemoth, identied with Rahab, is a
manifestation of Chaos in Isa. 30.6; cf. the association of Behemoth and
Leviathan in 1 En. 60.7ff. and 4 Esd. 6.49. The mythological signicance of
Leviathan at least is apparently assumed by LXX, which renders Leviathan as
ho drakn. Schmid admits that naturalistic features are lent to both creatures,
perhaps under the inuence of sapiential lists of natural phenomena such as
that indicated in ch. 9. We consider it more likely that the creatures were
primarily the hippopotamus and the crocodile, and that the mythological
1
490
Job 40.1541.26 (EVV 34). Wisdom Poems on Natural Themes
aspects, which we do not deny, were secondary. Leviathan is ltn of the Baal
myth of Ras Shamra, identied with the forces of primaeval chaos overcome
according to one version by Baal, the power of providence in nature, and
according to another by Baals sister and supporter in the maintenance of
Order, the goddess Anat. The hippopotamus was a manifestation of Seth in
Egyptian religion, the inveterate enemy of Horus, the champion of cosmos in
the myth and ritual of the temple at Edfu in Upper Egypt in a twelfth-century
text from Thebes (ANET, 14-17, esp. XII). Both the hippopotamus and the
crocodile are kings in their own realm (40.19, see textual note and Commentary ad loc., and 41.34), but they do not challenge the power of God; they lord
it over the beasts of the jungle, each in its own element.
Chapter 40.15-24, 31-32; 41.1-3 (EVV 40.15-24; 41.7-11):
Poem on Behemoth (the Huge Beast, i.e. the Hippopotamus)
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
31.
32.
41.2
1.
3.
Consider now the Beast before you,1

Which eats grass like an ox.
See the strength in his loins,
And the force in the muscles of his belly.
His tail is as stiff as a cedar,
The sinews of his thighs are close-knit;
His bones are brazen tubes,
His limbs are like bars of iron;
He is the rst of Gods ordered creation,
2Made to lord it over the pool,
Where the beasts of the mountains take their ease,
And all the wild creatures sport.3
He lies down where the mud is dry,
In the covert of reeds and mud,
Sheltered by the shade4 of the lotus trees,
Encompassed by the willows of the wadi.
If the river is in ood he is not startled,
He is condent though the river swells;
Into his mouth5 with open eyes he takes it in;
(Alone) among the river animals his snout protrudes.6
Will you ll his skin with barbs,
Or his head with whizzing harpoons?
Lay but your hand on him,
You will think no more of ght!
There is none so bold as to stir him up,7
And who can stand before him?8
See, ones hope is an illusion;
Even9 at the sight of him one is prostrated.
Who confronts him10 and comes off whole?11
Under all the heavens, who?12
The Book of Job
491
Textual Notes to Chapter 40.15-24, 31-32; 41.1-3

(EVV 40.15-24; 41.7-11)
Omitting aer with LXX. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading hey n habberh for MT h ygg arb and taking MT k of
v. 20 as a corruption of -kh in the Old Heb. script, this being the end of habberh
at the end of v. 19. See Commentary ad loc.
3. Reading bl hrm yily m / weol-ayya haaeh yiaq for MT bl hrm
yie-l / weol-ayya haaeh yeaaq-m. See Commentary ad loc.
4. Reading ilelm for MT ilal in agreement with the subject, m being corrupted to w
in the Old Heb. script. See Commentary ad loc.
5. Considerations of metre demand that el-ph (v. 23) be read with v. 24.
6. Reading yiqq app for MT yinqa-a. See Commentary ad loc.
7. Reading yerenn or yererenn for MT yerenn.
8. Reading lenyw with certain Heb. MS for MT lenay.
9. Reading gam for MT haJam.
10. Reading m yaqdmenn for MT m hiqdman.
11. Reading weyilm with LXX for MT waaallm.
12. Reading m-h for MT l-h, m being corrupted to l in the Old Heb. script.
1.
2.
Commentary on Chapter 40.15-24, 31-32; 41.1-3

(EVV 40.15-24; 41.7-11)
15ff. The occurrence of Leviathan (ltn), the mythical sea-monster of primaeval
chaos in the Ras Shamra texts, has suggested to Pope that behm, in which
the plural is the plural of excellence, may be similarly a mythical landcreature, and he cites the bovine monsters who brought about the downfall of
Baal in a Ras Shamra fragment (Gordon UT 75), with a presumed reference to
a supernatural bullock in another text (Gordon UT nt III, 41; 67, 4). There is
no suggestion in Job that Behemoth is a horned beast, as the description of
Baals adversaries in Gordon UT 75 explicitly states, nor indeed is there any
indication in the description of Leviathan in Job 40.25ff. that the creature is
mythical rather than natural. The descriptions of both, if poetic, are as detailed
as natural history. If it is true that Behemoth is taken as the chief of the beasts
of the dry land as Leviathan is of the reptiles, that does not mean that the role
of Behemoth and Leviathan as the mythical monsters of the dry land and
waters respectively in post-biblical eschatology (e.g. 1 En. 60.7-9 and 4 Ezra
6.49-52) was prior to the natural signicance of Behemoth, which means
simply beasts of the eld in Ps. 8.8; 73.22; Isa. 30.6; Joel 1.20; 2.22; Hab.
2.17. If there had been a mythical monster Behemoth, as Pope assumes, it is
strange that like Leviathan it should not appear with Rahab and Tannin, the
other monsters of primaeval chaos in Enthronement Psalms and other reections of the liturgy of the New Year festival in the Psalms and the Prophets.
Nor do we admit Popes reference to the supernatural bullock in the Ras
Shamra texts, gl el, which he so translates. We take gl el as an adverbial
accusative after the participle tk, describing the prodigious haste of the onset
1
492
(tk) of Death (mt). In the case of Leviathan, which is undoubtedly the crocodile, we have the natural particularization of a mythical monster. The natural
monster, the Beast par excellence, which is what the plural behm signies,
has become with Leviathan the symbol of the brute creation, the antithesis of
humans and their God-given nature and destiny in post-biblical apocalyptic.
Behemoth, though meaning the Beast par excellence, may be a popular adaptation of Egyptian p - i-mw (water-ox). We are prepared to admit that the
description of both beasts has mythical overtones (so Mowinckel), but they are
primarily natural. See the Introduction to the section.
In v. 15a LXX omits aer , with which we agree metri causa imm
means before you, indicating an example brought to ones notice. The eating
of grass refers to the food of the hippopotamus, which is notoriously destructive of crops (Erman 1927: 188 ff.).
16. The loins (monayim) denote both strength and virility; cf. Deut. 33.11.
The plural errm is a hapax legomenon. The adjective err, better known in
Aram. and Syr., means rm, hard, and errm may be the abstract plural
hardness, that is, of esh or rather muscle.
17. If zn means, as it does in the OT and cognate Semitic languages, tail,
the comparison with the cedar is strange. The passage poses, moreover, the
problem of the meaning of the verb a in the context. Ball suggested that it
is cognate with Arab. hafaa, one meaning of which is to remain long in one
place, thus referring to the stiffness of the short tail of the hippopotamus, the
only point of comparison with the cedar being its stillness or rigidity and
certainly not its length (so Dhorme, Friedrich Delitzsch, Budde, Duhm,
Strahan, Szczygiel, Buttenwieser, Hlscher, Steinmann, Larcher).
But the normal meaning of Arab. hafaa is to lower, and so the reference
may be to the erection of the penis of the hippopotamus, which, though
exaggerated, would suit the simile (so Fohrer). We cannot, however, attest this
meaning of zana in Heb. or any cognate language, but S evidently understood
this meaning of the passage, as also evidently LXX and V, which renders
stringit. Erection in the case of a quadruped would be lowering. The only
possible incidence of a in a physical sense in the OT is in Ps. 37.23:
myhwh mia-geer knn weark yep
By Yahweh a mans steps are established,
And his way is rm.
Here it must be admitted that the parallel with knn indicates the meaning of
a as is rm (so NEB), which would support Balls interpretation, if
indeed the verb is the same as a in Job 40.17. The rigidity of the short tail
of the hippopotamus would compare not inaptly with the cedar, which in its
trunk and branches is not pliant. paayw (Qere) is a hapax legomenon in the
1
The Book of Job
493
OT, being cognate with Arab. faadu(n) (thigh), as understood by S and

Saadyah, or as testicles (V), which renders ee with this meaning in Lev.
21.10. The meaning of ra is practically certain; cf. r vine-tendril
(Gen. 40.10, 12), Syr. rg means lattice, hence the verb would be to be
close-knit.
18. q means stream or bed of a stream, hence here pipe or tube.
mel, another hapax legomenon, is probably cognate with Arab. mamlu(n)
(a beaten strip of iron).
19. In dare, l, dere has the nuance of ordered government; cf. 26.14, as
drkt in the Ras Shamra texts. This is particularized in Gods ordered creation.
The phrase recalls the statement in Prov. 8.22 that Wisdom is r dark.
Pope would therefore see a reference in Job 40.19 to Behemoth the chief of
Gods primordial works. This would conict with the conception that Wisdom
was r dark, and we suggest that the phrase refers rather to the hippopotamus as the culmination of Gods brute creation, humans, as being created
in the image of God, being considered apart.
In v. 19b h yagg arb is obviously wrong. In retaining MT and
translating his maker may bring near his sword, Pope does not attempt to
explain the grammar of h , the construct of the participle with the
pronominal sufx and the denite article! Pope seems determined to secure a
correspondence between his assumed mythical Behemoth in Job and Behemoth
in post-biblical eschatology, where Behemoth is to provide sport for the
faithful and to be slain by the sword of God. We believe that the corrupt text
of v. 19b may have been the source of the eschatological conception in Midrash Rabba, Lev. 13.3 and Talmud Babli, Baba Bathra 75a (so also Larcher).
This would be an abrupt reference without precedent in the Book of Job. The
parallelism supports Giesebrechts emendation hey n aryw
(which is made as the ruler of its fellows). In this emendation certainly every
word of MT is emended, as Pope alleges, but no emendation is drastic or
arbitrary. All the corruptions assumed are natural errors at one stage or another
of the transmission of the text. The reading hey is attested in LXX.
Giesebrechts reading and interpretation is accepted by Duhm, Strahan,
Dhorme, Hlscher, Weiser, Steinmann, Mowinckel, Fohrer. Gunkel proposed
the variation hey n re (pausal form), which is made ruler of the
dry land, which might be supported by the description of Leviathan as king
over all the reptiles (41.26 [EVV 34]). The reading we suggest is hey n
habberh (which is created lord of the pool). Here alone the hippopotamus
may lord it over the beasts. This makes m in v. 20 explicable, which in MT is
isolated without an antecedent. In this connection it is noteworthy that in the
myth of the conict between Horus and Seth, the Edfu version of the conict
of cosmos and chaos, Seth was incarnate in the hippopotamus, and a text
relating to this theme on a papyrus from the eleventh century BCE describes
1
494
how Horus took a gigantic harpoon and threw it at the majesty of Seth (A.H.
Gardiner, The Chester Beatty Papyrus No. 1, 1931, Chapter 13, 11.9-10).
Fuller details of the myth of this conict, where Horus sustains the Order of
his father Re the sun-god against the menace of his enemies, particularly Seth
in the guise of a hippopotamus, by means of the ritual of the ceremonial
harpooning of the hippopotamus in the cult at Edfu are presented by H.W.
Fairman (1935; Fairman and Blackman 1942, 1943, 1944). In one passage the
vanquished enemies (unspecied) of Horus and Re are consigned to the river
and become hippopotami and crocodiles, an important detail which made it
easy to assimilate the crocodile to Leviathan, or Ugaritic ltn, the monster of
primaeval chaos. The emendation we propose anticipates the difculties in
v. 20 not only by supplying an antecedent to m, but in accounting for the
difcult k in v. 20a, by taking it as the last two consonants of habberh with
scribal corruption of h to k in the Old Heb. script. On n g see on 3.18.
20. We continue the text, reading bl hrm yily m / weol-ayya
haeh yiaq for MT k-bl hrm yie-l / weol-ayya haeh
yeaaq-m. We follow Tur-Sinai in taking bl hrm as corresponding to
Akk. bul eri (the beasts of the steppe). In reading yily (pausal form) we
follow the suggestion of Pope. No other reading which takes MT as meaning
for the mountains give him tribute (Dhorme), or produce (reading yel), or
reading the rivers (nehrm) for MT hrm, sustains the parallelism.
21-22. eelm is a hapax legomenon in the OT. In v. 22a it obviously signies
a tree, probably the lotus tree, so understood by Saadya, who rendered it by the
Arab. dallu(n). But the apparent repetition in v. 21a is suspect. In v. 22a the
word-play between eelm and ill indicates that eelm is genuine here. In v.
21a we suspect a homonym or at least a near-homonym of ealm, which we
nd in Arab. allu(n) (dry mud, possibly a mud-bank). This gives a
parallel to bih (mud) in v. 21b as well as affording a word-play with
eelm (lotus-trees). taat in v. 21a does not necessarily mean under but
rather where, lit. the place of; cf. Gordon, UT 2 Aqht V, 6-7: tt adrm (in
the place of the notables).
23. Dhorme takes yaaq nhr as the river is violent, citing Ass. equ (to
be strong, so Hlscher, Mowinckel, Fohrer, Pope). This is possible, but it is
also possible that yaaq is a corruption of yiqa (subsides; cf. Amos 9.3),
indicating the amphibious nature of the hippopotamus (so Gunkel and Budde).
But already the land-habits of the hippopotamus have been mentioned, and on
the principle of difcilior lectio potior the hapax legomenon yaaq is to be
preferred, giving a synonymous, not antithetic, parallel to ya (swells,
gushes; see on 38.8). hn is the Aram. particle if; cf. Arab. inna.
az is found as a synonym of yr in Deut. 20.3. Though this verb, as
the antithetic parallel to yia indicates, suggests that the latter verb means is
1
The Book of Job
495
condent, there is probably a double entendre, implying a homonym; cf.

Arab. baaa, meaning in the VII form to lie outstretched (cf. Guillaume
1963: 128). In characteristic word-play this is elaborated in the sequel, which
refers to the beast lying comfortably in the water with its snout protruding.
In v. 23a yardn does not mean Jordan, but is a common noun river in
parallel with nhr; cf. hayyardn hazzh in Gen. 32.11; Deut. 3.27; 31.32;
etc., and the phrase yardn yer in Num. 26.3, 63; 31.12; 33.48; 50; etc. In
Mandaean yardn is a common noun. The suggestion to omit yia (Pope) or
yardn (Fohrer) shows strange disregard for the parallelism and is not justied
metrically, especially if el-ph is taken with v. 34a as the metre demands.
24. Reading el-ph benyw yiqqenn (into his mouth, up to the eyes, he
takes it in) conjures up the picture of the gaping hippopotamus up to the
eyes in the river. The picture is amplied if with Guillaume (1963: 126) we
read MT with two slight emendations, app for ap and yiqqa or yiqq
(from qa), assuming the intrusion of n in MT yinqa by dittography before
q in the Old Heb. script, giving the translation (alone) among the river
animals his snout protrudes. We follow Guillaume in taking mqem as the
masc. plur. participle of a verb cognate with Arab. maqaa (to plunge into
water, transitive) and qa cognate with Arab. qabba, meaning in the V
form to protrude, whence qubbatu(n) (dome, lit. protuberance).
The unassailability of the hippopotamus by any tackle indicates that 40.3132; 41.1-3 (EVV 40.31-32; 41.7-11) on this theme belongs here to the passage
on the hippopotamus and not as in MT to that on the crocodile.
31. ukk is a hapax legomenon in the OT. Its general sense of barbs is not
in doubt, and Dhorme cites Akk. aktu (to be pointed); cf. Arab. ikkatu(n)
(weapon) from akka (to pierce), cited as cognate in BDB, though the
phonetic correspondence is irregular. ilal parallel with ukk may mean a
pointed missile. Connected with the verb lal (to tingle, e.g. the ears [2 Kgs
21.12]; cf. Arab. alalatu[n] [a resounding voice]), it might denote the
whirring harpoon.
32. We take zer as the innitive construct, the verbal noun, the object of
ts.
41.1. The 3rd masc. sing. pronom. sufx refers probably to the indenite
subject one. ha in MT hagam is probably a dittograph of the last consonant of
the preceding word. Pope sees a Masoretic suppression of a mythological
allusion in v. 1b, translating Were not the gods cast down at the sight of
him?; cf. Sym. and S, which read l (God or a god) for the preposition el,
but we prefer to take the subject of yual as that implied in the pronom. sufx
in t alt, taking gam with MT el-maryw (even at the sight of him). yul
(pausal form), Hophal form of l, is found most commonly in the Pilpel,
1
496
meaning to cast. It is attested in Ps. 37.24, where it denotes a more drastic

action than throw down, that is, utterly cast down. MT maryw (the sight
of him) may be retained as an abstract plural.
2. azr in the OT means cruel, erce. Here the sense is rather bold or
rash, as in Ben Sira 8.15.
Chapter 40.25-30; 41.4-26 (EVV 41.1-6, 12-34)
(40.25-30 secondarily drafted from after 39.30)
40.25.
24.
27.
28.
29.
30.
Can you draw out Leviathan with a hook

Or contend with him with a line in despite of his teeth?
Can you put a bridle on his snout,
Or pierce his jaws with a hook?
Will he make supplications to you,
Or speak softly to you?
Will he make a compact with you,
That you should take him as a servant for ever?
Could you make a pet of him like a bird,
And put him on a string for your little girls?
Will the wholesale merchants haggle over him?
Will they divide him among the retailers?
(For textual notes and commentary, see above, pp. 471, 480-81.)
41.4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
1
I will not keep silence concerning his limbs,

And I will declare1 his strength beyond compare.2
Who has come within the surface of his outer garment?
Who can penetrate the overlappings of his breastplate?3
Who has opened the doors of his mouth?4
About his teeth is terror.
His back5 is as tanned shields,
His breast is sealed with int.6
Each one (of the shield-scales) comes so close together
That no air can come between them;
Each one cleaves to the other,
They are interlocked and cannot be separated.
His sneezing7 makes the sunlight ash,
And his eyes are like the eyes of the dawn.
Out of his mouth go torches,
And sparks of re leap forth;
Out of his nostrils smoke issues,
As of a pot (on a re) blown into a blaze.8
His breath sets coals ablaze;
And a ame comes forth from his mouth.
In his neck reposes strength,
And before him dances dismay.
The akes of his esh are joined together,
The Book of Job

16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
497
Welded9 to him, immovable.10

His breast is rm as a stone,
As tight as a nether millstone.
At his uprising11 strong men are in dread,
From his gaping jaws12 they turn back.
If one would attack him the sword it is of no avail,
Nor with the spear, the shaft, the dart.
He accounts iron as straw,
Bronze as rotten wood.
The arrow cannot put him to ight;
With him sling-stones become mere chaff.
He will consider13 a club as chaff,
And he will laugh at the hurtling javelin.
His belly is as a plough-sock making a furrow,14
He lies like15 a sharp-studded threshing-sledge on the mud.
He makes the deep boil as a pot,
He makes the sea as an ointment-pot.
In his wake he makes a bright path;
One would think the deep was hoary.
He has not his peer16 on the earth,
Made without fear.
Of him all that is high is afraid;17
He is king over all the great beasts.
Textual Notes to Chapter 41.4-26 (EVV 12-34)

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
Reading waaabbr for MT ebar.

Reading n ere for MT wen erk, being corrupted to in the Old Heb. script,
and nal w in MT erk being a dittograph after k or before m of the following word
in the same script.
Reading iry n after LXX for MT risn. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading pw with S for MT pnyw.
Reading gwh with LXX, Aq and V for MT gaawh. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading ser m r for MT sr am r. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading ayw for MT ayw in agreement with the verb.
Reading m after LXX and V for MT weagm n.
Reading yq for MT yq in agreement with the plural subject. See
Commentary ad loc.
Reading yimm for MT yimm in agreement with the plural subject.
Reading mi with certain Heb. MSS for MT mi. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading mieryw for MT mierm, w being corrupted to m in the Old Heb.
script.
Reading nea l for MT nee.
Reading tatyw ke yaar for MT tatyw add re. See Commentary
ad loc.
Reading yirka for MT yirpa. See Commentary ad loc.
Reading mel for MT mel with LXX.
Reading kol-gah yr for MT e-kol-g ah yireh. See Commentary ad
loc.
498
Commentary on Chapter 41.4-26 (EVV 12-34)

For text and Commentary on 40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-7), see above p. 480, 490-91.
4. The parallelism with ger (his strength) indicates that baddyw means
his limbs and not his boasting or idle talk, as Pope proposes. For MT
ear ger wen erk Houbigants proposal waaabbr geur is
supported by the parallel l aar baddyw. MT wen erk might be a
corruption of wel erk, taking n as a scribal corruption of l in the Old Heb.
script, and ere in the sense of frame, arrangement of members (so NEB).
But equally feasible graphically would be n ere (without comparison),
nal w in MT erk being a dittograph after k or before the following m in the
Old Heb. script. We follow this suggestion of Ehrlich, which preserves the
meaning of the root ar in respect of comparison, which is actually attested
in 28.17, 19; cf. en keerk (a man like me, Ps. 55.14).
5. keel means doubling, hence overlapping (i.e. the folds of skin), here
compared to scale armour, which is illustrated by excavations in the palace at
Ras Shamra and elsewhere in the Near East. MT risn (his bridle) is an
obvious corruption of iry n (so LXX), his breastplate, as the parallelism
demands. The familiar spelling is iryn, but siryon is also attested (Jer. 46.4;
51.3). The phonetic variation indicates a non-Semitic loanword. The armour
iryn, a breast-plate both for men and horses, is known from an administrative text from the palace at Ras Shamra (RS 15.83, Virolleaud 1957: 123, 5-6).
The verb gillh parallel to b here recalls the similar collocation of those
verbs in the conventional description of entering in the Ras Shamra texts, for
example, tgly d il wtb (she cleared the threshold of El and entered). The
root is used regularly in Heb. of going into captivity; cf. Arab jala(y) (to
emigrate, pass over); and see on 38.17. In all cases it means going beyond a
certain point, whether going out or in. In the present passage uncover his
outer covering, assuming the familiar use of gillh in Heb., or pass within his
outer covering would be equally suitable, with the parallel b suggesting the
latter.
7. In MT gaawh aq minnm, which we nd unintelligible, gwh (his
back) should be read with LXX, Aq and V. aq immediately suggests watercourses, and Dhorme thinks of the depressions between the scales resembling
watercourses; cf. Isa. 8.7, where it has this meaning parallel with banks. The
word in Job 41.7, however, may rather be cognate with Arab. afaqa (to tan
leather), giving the meaning tanned work of shields, that is, tanned shields.
sr recalls the noun sr in the phrase ser libbm (their rib-cage) in
Hos. 13.8 and is so taken here by LXX. If the word is retained as a noun it may
be emended to se r (his breast), which the parallel gwh would suggest,
and MT m r might be then emended to m r (sealed with int).
1
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499
8. In v. 8b rewa is proposed for MT ra (wind, air), but ra, though

usually feminine, may also be masculine, here the subject of y.
9. The verb yeubbq, describing scale-armour, recalls deqm, the overlapping joints of the scale-amour of the king of Israel in 1 Kgs 22.34. On
yilakke (lit. seize hold of one another), cf. its use of water frozen to ice
(see 38.30).
10. The singular as should be read with LXX in agreement with the verb.
The word, a hapax legomenon in the OT, is onomatopoeic with an Arab.
cognate. r here probably means sun, as the parallel colon with dawn
(aar), suggests. The reference is to the reection of the sun in the humid
sneezing of the crocodile. The comparison of its eyes to the eyes of the dawn
(see above on 3.9) is then said to be in respect of the reddish glow of the
crocodiles eyes under the water, but it may also refer to the submersion of the
crocodile up to its eyes, suggesting the sun rising above the horizon. Fohrer
(1989: 530 n. 9) notes that the eyes of the crocodile represented the dawn in
ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics.
11. km is a hapax legomenon, but the association with (re) and the
Arab. kda, yakdu (to emit re or sparks) indicates sparks.
12. nerm is a hapax legomenon in the OT, but is known from the verbal
noun naar (snorting) in 39.20 and from Akk., Aram. and Arab. cognates.
Here n, usually smoke, means vapour. amn may be a corruption of
m or m (made to blaze); cf. Ass. agmu and Arab. ajama (to be
erce, of ame). LXX and S support the reading m. d means basket,
but also cooking pot (1 Sam. 2.14). d na recalls sr na of Jer.
1.15.
13. The parallelism with pw in v. 13b might support the meaning throat for
na, as Pope proposes, but in this case gelm (glowing coals; cf.
gaal in Lev. 16.12; Ps. 18.9), would be difcult. Hence we prefer the
conventional translation his breath sets coals ablaze, which still preserves the
parallelism, if not quite so mechanically.
14. The neck is the seat of strength, as in 15.26. In t deh, d is a
hapax legomenon in Heb. but known from, Syr., Aram. and Mandaean
cognates meaning to dance. MT deh, another hapax legomenon, means
faintness or dismay; cf. daan nee (Deut. 28.65). The inception may be
suggested by the imagery in Hab. 3.5 of pestilence (deer) and plague (ree),
attendants on Yahweh in the theophany; cf. Vine and eld, minor deities
attendant on Baal, and qd and amr, the attendants on the Mother-goddess in
the Baal myth at Ras Shamra. LXX offers a variant of deh (destruction).
1
500
As another variant deh might be suggested, cognate with Ugar. dbat

(strength), which would give a formal parallel to z (Cross 1952: 152-54).
We prefer to retain MT deh, primarily the effect of dismay, but implying
also the power to cause that effect.
15. mappel ber (lit. falling pieces of his esh or body), would suggest
folds of skin, the plural suggesting the emendation of MT yq to yuq
(Hophal) and of MT yimm in v. 15b to yimm. The verbs seem to suggest
something like scales rather than the folds of skin or esh, but these probably
have already been mentioned in vv. 7-9. Here the meaning is probably that
even the parts of the beast such as the joints, which have no scales, are still
protected by folds of skin that are loose enough, yet compact enough to
cushion a blow. The verb yaq has already occurred, meaning to smelt or
pour, and means here to fuse or weld.
16. Formally, yq could be the passive participle of yaq, meaning
moulded, so rmly set, hence hard as ice; cf. 37.10, where the Hophal is
used. Normally, however, we should expect a homonym, or near-homonym, of
yaq, which is used in v. 15, and yq in v. 16a may be the imperfect of q
(to be pressed hard). This might mean that the crocodile imposes hard
restraint on his feelings, but probably, as the simile as the nether millstone
indicates, means simply hard in the sense of compact, or tight.
l here (lit. heart), probably means breast, as in Akk. and Ugar.
17. The simplest solution of the difculty in v. 17a is to emend MT miss to
mi. It is noted that mi is found in the same context as fear here and
in 13.11 and 31.23 (cf. h in Prov. 3.25), which prompts Tur-Sinai to postulate a root h (fear), which, however, is not attested, though T and S
render by fear of him. We take mi to mean when he comes up on land.
lm is ambiguous. Pope, sustaining his thesis of the gods terried by the
monsters of chaos, renders gods. Alternatively we understand lm as
strong ones, scriptio defectiva of lm. The Hithpael of is found only
in Num. 8.21; 19.1, 12f., 20; 31.23, meaning to purify from sin. Thus we
must understand the verb in v. 17b as the cognate of Arab. aaa (to turn
back).
missebrm, the breakers of the sea or pool (reading miber ym), could
only mean the waves caused by the crocodiles rising out of the water. Pope
proposes that the breaking is a reference to the breaking of the loins as a
sign of fear, as is assumed in the Ras Shamra texts (e.g. Gordon, UT 51, II,
17). This depends on the acceptance of the hypothetical meaning of in the
parallel colon. Actually there is another possible Ugar. parallel in the word
brn (the open jaws); cf. Arab abaratu(n) (cavity), and see also Gordon,
UT 51, VIII:
1
The Book of Job

al tqrbn lbn ilm mt
al ydbkm kimr bph
klli bbrn qnh
501
Come not near to Mot the son of El

Lest he make you like a sheep in his mouth,
Like a goat in his jaws.
18. LXX, T, V and one Heb. MS read teh for MT mah, treating the
verb as a jussive in the protasis of a conditional sentence without the conditional particle. MT, however, may be retained as a case of the casus pendens in
the protasis in the conditional sentence, If one would attack him, the sword
does not avail; cf. 1 Sam. 2.13 kol- z a zea naar hakk hn
(if any man offered sacrice, the priests lad would come). See GKC,
16w.
The verb qm means literally to stand, Hiphil to establish, that is, to
bring ones purpose to effect, hence tqm here means will be of (no) avail.
This verse contains two hapax legomena, mass and iryh. Both are
obviously weapons, specically missiles. mass seems most obviously a
derivative of the verb nsa (to pull out, e.g. tent-pegs), so that here it may
possibly denote a javelin discharged from a slinging apparatus such as a stiff
leather pouch attached to the arm. iryh is cognate with Arab. irwatu(n)
(arrow).
20. The arrow is described as the son of the bow. The expression ben qee is
chosen for the sake of word-play with aen-qela (sling-stones). nehpe is
a very strong expression, denoting complete change.
21. For MT nee read nea l with the sing. subject t, understood by
Theod., V and T as club, cognate with Arab. mtaatu(n) from the root
wataa (to strike with a stick). raa signies both the quivering motion of
the javelin (kn) in ight and the whirring sound.
22. We consider the verb yirpa in v. 22b doubtful. It is found in MT 17.3 of
spreading a bed, more usually ra, but ra is a possible orthographic
variant. But in the present passage we suggest yirka cognate with Arab.
rakada (to be still), translating lying like a studded threshing-sledge. r
(lit. sharp-edged) describes the metal or sharp stone studs on the heavy
boards of the threshing-sledge; cf. Amos 1.3.
addd re, possibly sharp pieces of pottery, might just refer to the
studs of the threshing-sledge, but we would see rather a reference to another
agricultural implement, the sock of a plough; cf. Arab. adcatu, lar, the
iron tip, or sock of the wooden plough. We read tatyw ke yaar,
his belly is as a plough-sock making a furrow).
23. The verb ra is known in the OT only here and at 30.27, where it
describes guratively the state of Jobs bowels as boiling. melh, the
abyss or lower depths, the place of chaos in Mesopotamian mythology, is also
1
502
used of the depth of the sea in Exod. 15.5; Ps. 107.24; Jon. 2.4. ym may have
local reference to the habitat of the crocodile in the Nile, as in Isa. 18.2; 19.5;
Ezek. 32.2; Nah. 3.8; cf. Arab. barunnl. merqh means both perfumed
ointment (Ezek. 24.10) and, as here, ointment-pot. The verb rqa is used
of the compounding of perfumed oil for the sanctuary in Exod. 30.23.
24. The comparison of the wake of the crocodile to hoariness (h) recalls
poli thalass (the hoary sea) of Homer.
25. In v. 25a r (lit. dust) is simply a synonym of earth (ere). It means
in certain contexts (e.g. 7.21; 10.9; 17.16; 20.11; 34.15; Isa. 26.19; Ps. 22.16,
30) the dust of the grave and the underworld; hence its meaning earth must
be noted in view of the danger of drawing unwarranted doctrinal conclusions
from other passages where r occurs, for example, 19.25ff. MT moel (his
mastery, sc. means of mastering him), was read and understood by Sym. and
T. His like (mel; cf. Arab. miluhu), was read by the rest of the versions.
The word may well have been intentionally ambiguous, according to the style
of the writer, as indicated by the reference to the crocodile as king (mele), for
which m l is a synonym, over all the big game in v. 25b. Here the chiastic
parallelism of vv. 25-26 may be noted in support of this interpretation. So far
as the intentional ambiguity of moel or mel may be expressed in English,
we may suggest he has not his match.
26. In e-kol-g ah yireh (he looks on all that is high), we see an
antithesis to v. 25b in the chiasmus of vv. 25-26, and so read kol-g ah
yr (him all that is high fears; so Gunkel, Duhm, Budde, Hlscher, G.B.
Gray, Mowinckel, Fohrer). The emphatic position of must be noted. This
reading is supported by v. 26b.
In v. 26b MT ben-aa recalls the phrase describing the great beasts in
28.8. LXX creatures in the water, T little shes and S and 11QtargJob (r,
reptiles) might support a reading ben-ere (reptiles). It is doubtful,
however, after the unqualied statements in v. 25a and v. 26a if the dominion
of the crocodile should have been so limited. On aa, a cognate of Arab.
aaa (to be elevated), see on 28.8. The expression, conned to those two
passages in Job, may describe big game, but in the present passage naturally
includes all beasts and reptiles. The reference to the crocodile as king over all
the great beasts, though a natural metaphor, may also be a local allusion to the
fact that the crocodile was the hieroglyphic sign for king, as Fohrer (1989:
531) notes, following Erman (1894: 180).
Job 42.7-17
THE EPILOGUE
The epilogue falls into two parts, vv. 7-11 and 12-17. In the rst part, vv. 7-9
consists of Gods condemnation of Eliphaz and his friends, v. 10 of Jobs
intercession for them and the general statement of Jobs rehabilitation, and
v. 11 of his reintegration with society. The second part describes the details
of Jobs rehabilitation (vv. 12-17).
After the source of the Book had given Yahwehs answer to Job introduced
in 38.1 before its development in 38.240.14, and Jobs response, also
developed to suit the theme of the Book, Yahweh again speaks after these
words to Job (42.7), presumably conveying the divine approval of Jobs
submissive response in the original of 40.3-5; 42.1-6. What the friends have
said is condemned in Yahwehs censure of Eliphaz (v. 7). Formally this might
refer to what may have been said in the source to impair the orthodox faith
upheld in the spirit of his rm faith in divine providence expressed in 1.21 and
2.10. Or, however that may have been, it might have been the authors adaptation of his source in the Dialogue in the too facile assertion of the current
doctrine of the theodicy, which limited the power and purpose of God, in
contrast to Jobs maintenance of his integrity, realism and indeed honest
doubt. This remains, however, an unsolved problem, one that is in the state of
the evidence insoluble.
Source material may be detected in the divine name Yahweh (vv. 7, 9, 10,
11, 12), as in the introduction to the Divine Declaration (38.1) and the
Prologue. Jobs intercession for his friends (cf. Abrahams intercession, Gen.
18.23; 20.7) seems to reflect the Israelite adaptation of the source in the early
monarchy and the burnt offering of expiation (v. 8) agrees with Jobs sacrice
for his family in the Prologue (1.5).
In the rehabilitation of Job, two-fold restitution surely reflects the source,
likewise the reunion with his community after he had emerged from the cloud,
or what they apprehended as the wrath of God (v. 11). The presentation of a
piece of money and a gold ring also reflects source material, with reflections
of patriarchal tradition. qeih, for instance, is mentioned in Gen. 33.19 (J),
while a ring of gold, while familiar in all ages in the Near East as female
adornment (Isa. 3.2; Prov. 11.22), was a gift which Abrahams servant took to
Nahor (Gen. 24.22 [J]).
1
504
Job 42.7-17. The Epilogue
The specic details of the two-fold restitution of Jobs property is in the

vein of midrashic expansion, recalling the Aramaic midrash on Genesis from
Cave 1 at Qumran. To this belongs the names of Jobs three daughters (v. 14),
while the age of Job, twice the normal life-span of 70 years, reflects the ages
of the patriarchs (Gen. 25.8, Abraham; 50.26, Joseph) in the Pentateuch in the
nature of midrashic expansion. Here it may be noted that after the note on the
two-fold restitution of Jobs property after his intercession for his friends
(v. 10) 11QtargJob ends with the condolence of family and friends and their
tokens of his reintegration in society (v. 11).
Chapter 42.7-17
7. And it came to pass after Yahweh had spoken these words to Job that Yahweh said to
Eliphaz the Temanite, I am angry with you and your two friends because you did not
speak right concerning me1 like my servant Job. 8. But now take for yourselves seven
bullocks and seven rams and go to my servant Job and offer up a whole burnt-offering on
behalf of yourselves, and let my servant Job intercede for you; for I will accept2 his
petition that I may not act according to your obtuseness3 in that you have not spoken
concerning me4 what was right like my servant Job 9. So Eliphaz the Temanite and
Bildad the Shuhite and5 Zophar the Naamathite went and did as Yahweh had told them,
and Yahweh accepted Job. 10. And Yahweh rehabilitated6 Job when he had interceded
for his friends,7 and Yahweh increased all that Job had two-fold. 11. And all his brothers
and all his sisters and all who formerly knew him ate and drank8 with him, and they
showed their sorrow for him and comforted him for all the calamity that Yahweh had
brought upon him, and they gave him each one qeih and one gold ring.
12. And Yahweh blessed the latter part of Jobs life more than the former part. He had
14,000 small cattle and 6000 camels and 1000 yoke of oxen and 1000 she-asses. 13. And
he had (twice) seven sons and three daughters, 14. And he called the rst Yemmh and
the second Qeh and the third Qeren-happk. 15. And women as beautiful as the
daughters of Job were not to be found9 in all the earth; and their father10 gave them11 an
inheritance among their brothers.12 16. And Job lived after this a hundred and forty years,
and he saw13 his sons and his sons sons (to) four generations. 17. And Job died old and
full of years.
Textual Notes to Chapter 42.7-17

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
1
Reading lay for MT lay.

Reading et-pnyw for MT im-pnyw.
Reading im nebleem for MT immaem nelh.
Reading lay for MT lay.
Reading wear with LXX, S and V and many Heb. MSS.
Reading e (Qere). See Commentary ad loc.
Reading ryw for MT rh, y being corrupted to h in the Old Heb. script.
Reading wayyit with LXX and one Heb. MS and omitting leem be (bread in
his house) with LXX and two Heb. MSS. 11QtargJob, however, follows MT.
Reading nime with LXX, S, and V and two Heb. MSS for MT nim, nal w being
omitted by haplography before the following n in the Old Heb. script.
The Book of Job

10.
11.
12.
13.
505
Insert ahen with ve Heb. MSS.

Reading lhen for MT lhem with ve Heb. MSS.
Reading ahen for MT ahem with three Heb. MSS.
Reading wayyar (Kethib).
Commentary on Chapter 42.7-17

7. aar dibbr indicates Late Heb. prose. Classical Heb. would have used the
innitive construct after aar.
nenh (lit. that which is adjusted) means proper, right.
8. In MT k im Budde omitted im, and Dhorme, closer to MT, read ke-,
which we accept.
On n pnm (to raise the face), hence LXX prospolambanein, to
show favour, see above on 11.15.
The designation of Job as my servant, as in 1.8 and 2.3, is signicant. The
term indicates the condant, mediator and executor of the will of the master,
for example the king in Canaan, called in royal legends from Ras Shamra bd
il or lm il, and in Israel my servant David, as well as the atoning servant in
Deutero-Isaiah (Isa. 52.1353.12). Here it is peculiarly apt because of Jobs
unique, personal experience of God with relation to his friends, his unqualied
submission and his intercessory ofce, which he exercises like Abraham, the
friend of God. The amount of the expiatory sacrices (cf. Lev. 4), conventionally sevenfold, indicates the popular style of this part of the Book of Job.
yipalll is used in its primary sense of intercessory prayer.
nelh, which generally indicates conduct which respects neither reason
nor social conventionnor religionis surprising, with reference to Gods
treatment of humans. Here, if it really refers to Gods conduct, it would have a
secondary sense of rough handling, treating humans with as little consideration as they had shown to God and their fellows. In the context of Wisdom
literature, however, it generally signies moral and intellectual obtuseness,
and MT may be a corruption of im nileem (according to your obtuseness), the pronominal sufx in the noun having been omitted by haplography
before k in the Old Heb. script. In this case im could have the comparative
sense in proportion to, as regularly in Heb. Wisdom literature.
10. e (Qere) means rehabilitated, which in the context includes the
healing of Job, though that is probably not specically visualized, as Budde
and Alt (1937: 267) suggested. In cases like Jer. 29.14; 30.3, 18; 49.29; Ezek.
16.53; 39.25; etc., it refers to the rehabilitation of a people, and it was
eventually applied to the rehabilitation par excellence, the restoration from
exile or captivity (e), from the verb h (to be captive), but the pointing
e indicates that the phrase refers to rehabilitation with no implication of
return from exile. The phrase, apparently with an internal accusative e,
1
506
Job 42.7-17. The Epilogue
may owe its anomalous form in Classical Heb. to the fact that it was an archaic
survival from the liturgy of the New Year festival as is indicated by its use in
the eschatological passage Joel 4.1 (EVV 3.1). The flexibility of the phrase is
indicated in Lam. 2.14, where h e refers to repentance effected by the
prophets.
11. With LXX and one Heb. MS we should read wayyit after wayyel.
Jobs ritual seclusion imposed by the apparent alienation of the sufferer from
God is over, and the eating and drinking of his friends with him symbolizes
this fact, so inaugurating reintegration of Job with society. The occasion,
though not to be compared with mourning rites, was not the occasion for
hilarity, so Jobs friends nodded the head or rocked to and fro (wayynu)
for him, like Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar at the beginning of Jobs calamity
(2.11), which may indeed indicate that the present passage has been influenced
by the former. MT qeh is spelled qeh in Gen. 33.19 and Josh. 24.32, but
the noun qo is found in Prov. 22.21, where it qualies words of truth; cf.
qe in Palestinian Aram. It is attested in Arab. qiu(n) (justice), for example, a just measure of grain in its container. Coinage is not known in the
ancient Near East until its introduction in Asia Minor in the sixth century BCE.
qeh therefore is a piece of silver of guaranteed weight. The word here may
represent the archaizing of the narrative in the source cast in patriarchal times
when a hundred qet is given as the price of the ground acquired by Jacob at
Shechem (Gen. 33.19). nezem denotes an earring in Gen. 35.4 and Judg. 8.24,
and a nose-ring in Gen. 24.47; Isa. 3.21.
13. In the fashion of folk-tale and midrash Jobs property is doubled. According to T this extends to his sons, taking inh as fourteen; so also Pope,
assuming the ending -nh as the archaic dual for Classical Heb. ayim; cf.
Arab. -ani. Alternatively -ana may be a scribal corruption of the adverbial
ending m, giving the reading ea-m (seven-fold). Both are understood by
the variants eh and in in different Heb. MSS. On the proportion of sons
to daughters, reflecting their respective social signicance, see on 3.21.
14. The names of Jobs daughters reflect the popular folk-tale or midrash.
yemmh (turtle-dove) is known in Arab. yammatu(n), and is mentioned in
Song 2.14; 5.2; 6.9. qeh is possibly mentioned in Ps. 45.9 with myrrh and
aloes. It is said to be a fragrant bark, powdered for cosmetics. qeren-happ is
horn of antimony, hence Larchers mascara (JB). Antimony was powdered
and used as eye-cosmetic (Arab. kulu[n]), which was used by Jezebel in her
last make-up (2 Kgs 9.30).
15. A portion to daughters when sons were alive was exceptional in antiquity.
Indeed, in the case of Zelophehads daughters, who had no brothers alive, was
rare enough to merit special notice in Heb. tradition. The case of Jobs
1
The Book of Job
507
daughters may be designed to indicate his superabundant affluence, or it may

reflect the status of women in the Jewish community when the Book of Job
was completed. The situation is analogous to that of women in the Jewish
military colony at Elephantine in the fth century BCE (ANET, 222f.).
In the style of folk-tale or midrash Job is said to have lived 140 years, twice
the normal life-span (Ps. 90.10). His life, like his property, is doubled. The
statement of LXX that Job lived 240 years (248 according to LXXB) and further
details of his family and descendants, which LXX gives on the authority of a
Syriac Book, indicate that the midrashic tendency to expand the Job tradition
was active.
17. And Job died old and full of years shows the influence of the patriarchal
narratives in the Pentateuch, for example, Gen. 25.8; 35.29 (both P).
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The Book of Job (Text of The Hebrew Bible S)

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THE BOOK OF JOB

The Text of the Hebrew Bible, 1

THE BOOK OF JOB

Edited by David J.A. Clines

SHEFFIELD PHOENIX PRESS

Copyright 2010 Sheffield Phoenix Press

All rights reserved.

A CIP catalogue record for this book

The Book of Job

Job 35.1; 33.31-33; 35.236.25

INTRODUCTION TO JOB 3841

Job 39 and 40.25-30 (EVV 41.1-6)

The Book of Job

Job 40.2, 7-14

Job 40.3-5; 42.2-6

Job 40.1541.26 (EVV 34)

Targum of Job from Qumran Cave 11

Gesenius-Buhl, Hebrisches und aramisches Handwrterbuch ber

The Book of Job

Job 1 and 2: The Prologue

recognition of the use and adaptation of Hebrew literary forms in Job is a

2. Job in the Context

classied lists of phenomena of this type in Israel is no doubt the factual

The Book of Job

2. Job in the Context

crisis of personal belief. Fundamentally, however, the problems of the writers

The Book of Job

Compare Job 19.13-17:

Another feature common to the two works is the statement of innocence:

2. Job in the Context

The discussion of the moral problem of an innocent orphan wronged in an

The answer in the Babylonian Theodicy is that of orthodox theology: death

Compare the words of Eliphaz in Job 4.7-8:

Compare the preface to the speech of Eliphaz in Job 4.4-5:

The Book of Job

Compare Job 21.7-13:

The friend of the Babylonian sufferer nevertheless reasserts the principle of

Compare Job 36.2637.24:

2. Job in the Context

Another such text is that published by J. Nougayrol (1952) as Une version

The Book of Job

The road is levelled; grace is granted to thee.

and the advice of Elihu to Job (36.24):

2. Job in the Context

The Book of Job

connected with the confession, or in this case the protestation, of the

2. Job in the Context

sufferer as to give him sufcient evidence to make a solution of his problem at

The Book of Job

The declaration of faith leads on to praise of the sufferers god.

13. J. Wellhausen (1914: 207 n. 2) proposed a folk-saga; K. Budde (1896) envisaged

2. Job in the Context

The Book of Job

2. Job in the Context

alienated by his suffering as the orthodox ethic assumed. So long as humans

3. Job in Hebrew Wisdom

scientic classication according to common characteristics, which extended

The Book of Job

experienced by the prophet and communicated by him to the people. The

3. Job in Hebrew Wisdom

The Book of Job

3. Job in Hebrew Wisdom

The Book of Job