3:10 because it 1 did not shut the doors 2 of my mother’s womb on me, 3
nor did it hide trouble 4 from my eyes!
4:8 Even as I have seen, 5 those who plow 6 iniquity 7
and those who sow trouble reap the same. 8
11:16 For you 9 will forget your trouble; 10
you will remember it
like water that 11 has flowed away.
15:35 They conceive 12 trouble and bring forth evil;
their belly 13 prepares deception.”
20:22 In the fullness of his sufficiency, 14
distress 15 overtakes him.
the full force of misery will come upon him. 16
1 tn The subject is still “that night.” Here, at the end of this first section, Job finally expresses the crime of that night – it did not hinder his birth.
2 sn This use of doors for the womb forms an implied comparison; the night should have hindered conception (see Gen 20:18 and 1 Sam 1:5).
3 tn The Hebrew has simply “my belly [= womb].” The suffix on the noun must be objective – it was the womb of Job’s mother in which he lay before his birth. See however N. C. Habel, “The Dative Suffix in Job 33:13,” Bib 63 (1982): 258-59, who thinks it is deliberately ambiguous.
4 tn The word עָמָל (’amal) means “work, heavy labor, agonizing labor, struggle” with the idea of fatigue and pain.
5 tn The perfect verb here represents the indefinite past. It has no specific sighting in mind, but refers to each time he has seen the wicked do this.
6 sn The figure is an implied metaphor. Plowing suggests the idea of deliberately preparing (or cultivating) life for evil. This describes those who are fundamentally wicked.
7 tn The LXX renders this with a plural “barren places.”
8 tn Heb “reap it.”
9 tn For a second time (see v. 13) Zophar employs the emphatic personal pronoun. Could he be providing a gentle reminder that Job might have forgotten the sin that has brought this trouble? After all, there will come a time when Job will not remember this time of trial.
10 sn It is interesting to note in the book that the resolution of Job’s trouble did not come in the way that Zophar prescribed it.
11 tn The perfect verb forms an abbreviated relative clause (without the pronoun) modifying “water.”
13 tn Infinitives absolute are used in this verse in the place of finite verbs. They lend a greater vividness to the description, stressing the basic meaning of the words.
14 tn At the start of the speech Eliphaz said Job’s belly was filled with the wind; now it is there that he prepares deception. This inclusio frames the speech.
17 tn The word שָׂפַק (safaq) occurs only here; it means “sufficiency; wealth; abundance (see D. W. Thomas, “The Text of Jesaia 2:6 and the Word sapaq,” ZAW 75 [1963]: 88-90).
18 tn Heb “there is straightness for him.” The root צָרַר (tsarar) means “to be narrowed in straits, to be in a bind.” The word here would have the idea of pressure, stress, trouble. One could say he is in a bind.
19 tn Heb “every hand of trouble comes to him.” The pointing of עָמֵל (’amel) indicates it would refer to one who brings trouble; LXX and Latin read an abstract noun עָמָל (’amal, “trouble”) here.