Job 18:4

18:4 You who tear yourself ¹  to pieces in your anger,

will the earth be abandoned ²  for your sake?

Or will a rock be moved from its place? ³ 

Job 21:17

How Often Do the Wicked Suffer?

21:17 “How often ⁴  is the lamp of the wicked extinguished?

How often does their ⁵  misfortune come upon them?

How often does God apportion pain ⁶  to them ⁷  in his anger?

[18:4]  ¹ tn The construction uses the participle and then 3rd person suffixes: “O tearer of himself in his anger.” But it is clearly referring to Job, and so the direct second person pronouns should be used to make that clear. The LXX is an approximation or paraphrase here: “Anger has possessed you, for what if you should die – would under heaven be desolate, or shall the mountains be overthrown from their foundations?”

[18:4]  ² tn There is a good deal of study on this word in this passage, and in Job in general. M. Dahood suggested a root עָזַב (’azav) meaning “to arrange; to rearrange” (“The Root ’zb II in Job,” JBL 78 [1959]: 303-9). But this is refuted by H. G. M. Williamson, “A Reconsideration of ’zb II in Biblical Hebrew,” ZAW 97 (1985): 74-85.

[18:4]  ³ sn Bildad is asking if Job thinks the whole moral order of the world should be interrupted for his sake, that he may escape the punishment for wickedness.

[21:17]  ⁴ tn The interrogative “How often” occurs only with the first colon; it is supplied for smoother reading in the next two.

[21:17]  ⁵ tn The pronominal suffix is objective; it re-enforces the object of the preposition, “upon them.” The verb in the clause is בּוֹא (bo’) followed by עַל (’al), “come upon [or against],” may be interpreted as meaning attack or strike.

[21:17]  ⁶ tn חֲבָלִים (khavalim) can mean “ropes” or “cords,” but that would not go with the verb “apportion” in this line. The meaning of “pangs (as in “birth-pangs”) seems to fit best here. The wider meaning would be “physical agony.”

[21:17]  ⁷ tn The phrase “to them” is understood and thus is supplied in the translation for clarification.