32:34 “Is this not stored up with me?” says the Lord, 1
“Is it not sealed up in my storehouses?
32:35 I will get revenge and pay them back
at the time their foot slips;
for the day of their disaster is near,
and the impending judgment 2 is rushing upon them!”
14:17 My offenses would be sealed up 3 in a bag; 4
you would cover over 5 my sin.
21:19 You may say, 6 ‘God stores up a man’s 7 punishment for his children!’ 8
Instead let him repay 9 the man himself 10
so that 11 he may know it!
1 tn Verses 34-35 appear to be a quotation of the
2 tn Heb “prepared things,” “impending things.” See BDB 800 s.v. עָתִיד.
3 tn The passive participle חָתֻם (khatum), from חָתַם (khatam, “seal”), which is used frequently in the Bible, means “sealed up.” The image of sealing sins in a bag is another of the many poetic ways of expressing the removal of sin from the individual (see 1 Sam 25:29). Since the term most frequently describes sealed documents, the idea here may be more that of sealing in a bag the record of Job’s sins (see D. J. A. Clines, Job [WBC], 334).
4 tn The idea has been presented that the background of putting tally stones in a bag is intended (see A. L. Oppenheim, “On an Operational Device in Mesopotamian Bureaucracy,” JNES 18 [1959]: 121-28).
5 tn This verb was used in Job 13:4 for “plasterers of lies.” The idea is probably that God coats or paints over the sins so that they are forgotten (see Isa 1:18). A. B. Davidson (Job, 105) suggests that the sins are preserved until full punishment is exacted. But the verse still seems to be continuing the thought of how the sins would be forgotten in the next life.
6 tn These words are supplied. The verse records an idea that Job suspected they might have, namely, that if the wicked die well God will make their children pay for the sins (see Job 5:4; 20:10; as well as Exod 20:5).
7 tn The text simply has אוֹנוֹ (’ono, “his iniquity”), but by usage, “the punishment for the iniquity.”
8 tn Heb “his sons.”
9 tn The verb שָׁלַם (shalam) in the Piel has the meaning of restoring things to their normal, making whole, and so reward, repay (if for sins), or recompense in general.
10 tn The text simply has “let him repay [to] him.”
11 tn The imperfect verb after the jussive carries the meaning of a purpose clause, and so taken as a final imperfect: “in order that he may know [or realize].”
12 tn Grk “hardness.” Concerning this imagery, see Jer 4:4; Ezek 3:7; 1 En. 16:3.
13 tn Grk “in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.”