Job 16:2

16:2 “I have heard many things like these before.

What miserable comforters ¹  are you all!

Job 16:7

16:7 Surely now he ²  has worn me out,

you have devastated my entire household.

Job 17:7

17:7 My eyes have grown dim ³  with grief;

my whole frame ⁴  is but a shadow.

Job 33:11

33:11 ⁵ He puts my feet in shackles;

he watches closely all my paths.’

[16:2]  ¹ tn The expression uses the Piel participle in construct: מְנַחֲמֵי עָמָל (mÿnahame ’amal, “comforters of trouble”), i.e., comforters who increase trouble instead of relieving it. D. W. Thomas translates this “breathers out of trouble” (“A Note on the Hebrew Root naham,” ExpTim 44 [1932/33]: 192).

[16:7]  ² tn In poetic discourse there is often an abrupt change from person to another. See GKC 462 §144.p. Some take the subject of this verb to be God, others the pain (“surely now it has worn me out”).

[17:7]  ³ tn See the usage of this verb in Gen 27:1 and Deut 34:7. Usually it is age that causes the failing eyesight, but here it is the grief.

[17:7]  ⁴ tn The word יְצֻרִים (yÿtsurim), here with a suffix, occurs only here in the Bible. The word is related to יָצַר (yatsar, “to form, fashion”). And so Targum Job has “my forms,” and the Vulgate “my members.” The Syriac uses “thoughts” to reflect יֵצֶר (yetser). Some have followed this to interpret, “all my thoughts have dissolved into shadows.” But the parallel with “eye” would suggest “form.” The plural “my forms, all of them” would refer to the whole body.

[33:11]  ⁴ sn See Job 13:27.