Job 11:19

11:19 You will lie down with ¹  no one to make you afraid,

and many will seek your favor. ² 

Job 13:8

13:8 Will you show him partiality? ³ 

Will you argue the case ⁴  for God?

Job 13:24

13:24 Why do you hide your face ⁵ 

and regard me as your enemy?

Job 14:20

14:20 You overpower him once for all, ⁶ 

and he departs;

you change ⁷  his appearance

and send him away.

Job 15:7

15:7 “Were you the first man ever born?

Were you brought forth before the hills?

Job 17:6

17:6 He has made me ⁸  a byword ⁹  to people,

I am the one in whose face they spit. ¹⁰ 

Job 21:8

21:8 Their children ¹¹  are firmly established

in their presence, ¹² 

their offspring before their eyes.

Job 23:4

23:4 I would lay out my case ¹³  before him

and fill my mouth with arguments.

Job 26:9

26:9 He conceals ¹⁴  the face of the full moon, ¹⁵ 

shrouding it with his clouds.

Job 33:5

33:5 Reply to me, if you can;

set your arguments ¹⁶  in order before me

and take your stand!

Job 38:30

38:30 when the waters become hard ¹⁷  like stone,

when the surface of the deep is frozen solid?

Job 40:13

40:13 Hide them in the dust ¹⁸  together,

imprison ¹⁹  them ²⁰  in the grave. ²¹ 

[11:19]  ¹ tn The clause that reads “and there is no one making you afraid,” is functioning circumstantially here (see 5:4; 10:7).

[11:19]  ² tn Heb “they will stroke your face,” a picture drawn from the domestic scene of a child stroking the face of the parent. The verb is a Piel, meaning “stroke, make soft.” It is used in the Bible of seeking favor from God (supplication); but it may on the human level also mean seeking to sway people by flattery. See further D. R. Ap-Thomas, “Notes on Some Terms Relating to Prayer,” VT 6 (1956): 225-41.

[13:8]  ³ sn The idiom used here is “Will you lift up his face?” Here Job is being very sarcastic, for this expression usually means that a judge is taking a bribe. Job is accusing them of taking God’s side.

[13:8]  ⁴ tn The same root is used here (רִיב, riv, “dispute, contention”) as in v. 6b (see note).

[13:24]  ⁵ sn The anthropomorphism of “hide the face” indicates a withdrawal of favor and an outpouring of wrath (see Ps 30:7 [8]; Isa 54:8; Ps 27:9). Sometimes God “hides his face” to make himself invisible or aloof (see 34:29). In either case, if God covers his face it is because he considers Job an enemy – at least this is what Job thinks.

[14:20]  ⁷ tn D. W. Thomas took נֵצַח (netsakh) here to have a superlative meaning: “You prevail utterly against him” (“Use of netsach as a superlative in Hebrew,” JSS 1 [1956]: 107). Death would be God’s complete victory over him.

[14:20]  ⁸ tn The subject of the participle is most likely God in this context. Some take it to be man, saying “his face changes.” Others emend the text to read an imperfect verb, but this is not necessary.

[17:6]  ⁹ tn The verb is the third person, and so God is likely the subject. The LXX has “you have made me.” So most commentators clarify the verb in some such way. However, without an expressed subject it can also be taken as a passive.

[17:6]  ¹⁰ tn The word “byword” is related to the word translated “proverb” in the Bible (מָשָׁל, mashal). Job’s case is so well known that he is synonymous with afflictions and with abuse by people.

[17:6]  ¹¹ tn The word תֹפֶת (tofet) is a hapax legomenon. The expression is “and a spitting in/to the face I have become,” i.e., “I have become one in whose face people spit.” Various suggestions have been made, including a link to Tophet, but they are weak. The verse as it exists in the MT is fine, and fits the context well.

[21:8]  ¹¹ tn Heb “their seed.”

[21:8]  ¹² tn The text uses לִפְנֵיהֶם עִמָּם (lifnehem ’immam, “before them, with them”). Many editors think that these were alternative readings, and so omit one or the other. Dhorme moved עִמָּם (’immam) to the second half of the verse and emended it to read עֹמְדִים (’omÿdim, “abide”). Kissane and Gordis changed only the vowels and came up with עַמָּם (’ammam, “their kinfolk”). But Gordis thinks the presence of both of them in the line is evidence of a conflated reading (p. 229).

[23:4]  ¹³ tn The word מִשְׁפָּט (mishpat) is normally “judgment; decision.” But in these contexts it refers to the legal case that Job will bring before God. With the verb עָרַךְ (’arakh, “to set in order; to lay out”) the whole image of drawing up a lawsuit is complete.

[26:9]  ¹⁵ tn The verb means “to hold; to seize,” here in the sense of shutting up, enshrouding, or concealing.

[26:9]  ¹⁶ tc The MT has כִסֵּה (khisseh), which is a problematic vocalization. Most certainly כֵּסֶה (keseh), alternative for כֶּסֶא (kese’, “full moon”) is intended here. The MT is close to the form of “throne,” which would be כִּסֵּא (kisse’, cf. NLT “he shrouds his throne with his clouds”). But here God is covering the face of the moon by hiding it behind clouds.

[33:5]  ¹⁷ tn The Hebrew text does not contain the term “arguments,” but this verb has been used already for preparing or arranging a defense.

[38:30]  ¹⁹ tn Several suggest that the verb is not from חָבָא (khava’, “to hide”) but from a homonym, “to congeal.” This may be too difficult to support, however.

[40:13]  ²¹ tn The word “dust” can mean “ground” here, or more likely, “grave.”

[40:13]  ²² tn The verb חָבַשׁ (khavash) means “to bind.” In Arabic the word means “to bind” in the sense of “to imprison,” and that fits here.

[40:13]  ²³ tn Heb “their faces.”

[40:13]  ²⁴ tn The word is “secret place,” the place where he is to hide them, i.e., the grave. The text uses the word “secret place” as a metonymy for the grave.