Job 2:12

2:12 But when they gazed intently ¹  from a distance but did not recognize ²  him, they began to weep loudly. Each of them tore his robes, and they threw dust into the air over their heads. ³ 

Jeremiah 17:13

17:13 You are the one in whom Israel may find hope. ⁴ 

All who leave you will suffer shame.

Those who turn away from you ⁵  will be consigned to the nether world. ⁶ 

For they have rejected you, the Lord, the fountain of life. ⁷ 

Lamentations 3:29

3:29 Let him bury his face in the dust; ⁸ 

perhaps there is hope.

John 8:6

8:6 (Now they were asking this in an attempt to trap him, so that they could bring charges against ⁹  him.) ¹⁰  Jesus bent down and wrote on the ground with his finger. ¹¹ 

John 8:8

8:8 Then ¹²  he bent over again and wrote on the ground.

[2:12]  ¹ tn Heb “they lifted up their eyes.” The idiom “to lift up the eyes” (or “to lift up the voice”) is intended to show a special intensity in the effort. Here it would indicate that they were trying to see Job from a great distance away.

[2:12]  ² tn The Hiphil perfect here should take the nuance of potential perfect – they were not able to recognize him. In other words, this does not mean that they did not know it was Job, only that he did not look anything like the Job they knew.

[2:12]  ³ tn Heb “they tossed dust skyward over their heads.”

[17:13]  ⁴ tn Heb “O glorious throne, O high place from the beginning, O hope of Israel, O Lord.” Commentators and translators generally understand these four lines (which are three in the Hebrew original) as two predications, one eulogizing the temple and the other eulogizing God. However, that does not fit the context very well and does not take into account the nature of Jeremiah’s doxology in Jeremiah 16:19-20 (and compare also 10:6-7). There the doxology is context motivated, focused on God, and calls on relevant attributes in the form of metaphorical epithets. That fits nicely here as well. For the relevant parallel passages see the study note.

[17:13]  ⁵ tc The translation is based on an emendation suggested in W. L. Holladay, Jeremiah (Hermeneia), 1:500, n. b-b. The emendation involves following the reading preferred by the Masoretes (the Qere) and understanding the preposition with the following word as a corruption of the suffix on it. Thus the present translation reads וּסוּרֶיךָ אֶרֶץ (usurekha ’erets) instead of וּסוּרַי בָּאֶרֶץ (usuray ba’erets, “and those who leave me will be written in the earth”), a reading which is highly improbable since all the other pronouns are second singular.

[17:13]  ⁶ tn Or “to the world of the dead.” An alternative interpretation is: “will be as though their names were written in the dust”; Heb “will be written in the dust.” The translation follows the nuance of “earth” listed in HALOT 88 s.v. אֶרֶץ 4 and found in Jonah 2:6 (2:7 HT); Job 10:21-22. For the nuance of “enrolling, registering among the number” for the verb translated here “consign” see BDB 507 s.v. כָּתַב Qal.3 and 508 s.v. Niph.2 and compare usage in Ezek 13:9 and Ps 69:28 (69:29 HT).

[17:13]  ⁷ tn Heb “The fountain of living water.” For an earlier use of this metaphor and the explanation of it see Jer 2:13 and the notes there. There does not appear to be any way to retain this metaphor in the text without explaining it. In the earlier text the context would show that literal water was not involved. Here it might still be assumed that the Lord merely gives life-giving water.

[3:29]  ⁸ tn Heb “Let him put his mouth in the dust.”

[8:6]  ⁹ tn Grk “so that they could accuse.”

[8:6]  ¹⁰ sn This is a parenthetical note by the author of 7:53–8:11.

[8:6]  ¹¹ tn Or possibly “Jesus bent down and wrote an accusation on the ground with his finger.” The Greek verb καταγράφω (katagrafw) may indicate only the action of writing on the ground by Jesus, but in the overall context (Jesus’ response to the accusation against the woman) it can also be interpreted as implying that what Jesus wrote was a counteraccusation against the accusers (although there is no clue as to the actual content of what he wrote, some scribes added “the sins of each one of them” either here or at the end of v. 8 [U 264 700 al]).

[8:8]  ¹² tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “Then” to indicate the implied sequence of events within the narrative. Greek style often begins sentences or clauses with “and,” but English style generally does not.