Job 16:17-19

16:17 although there is no violence in my hands

and my prayer is pure.

An Appeal to God as Witness

16:18 “O earth, do not cover my blood,

nor let there be a secret place for my cry.

16:19 Even now my witness is in heaven;

my advocate is on high.


tn For the use of the preposition עַל (’al) to introduce concessive clauses, see GKC 499 §160.c.

sn Job knows that he will die, and that his death, signified here by blood on the ground, will cry out for vindication.

tn The word is simply “a place,” but in the context it surely means a hidden place, a secret place that would never be discovered (see 18:21).

sn The witness in heaven must be God, to whom the cries and prayers come. Job’s dilemma is serious, but common to the human experience: the hostility of God toward him is baffling, but he is conscious of his innocence and can call on God to be his witness.

tn The parallelism now uses the Aramaic word “my advocate” – the one who testifies on my behalf. The word again appears in Gen 31:47 for Laban’s naming of the “heap of witness” in Aramaic – “Sahadutha.”