Job 22:25

22:25 then the Almighty himself will be your gold, ¹ 

and the choicest ²  silver for you.

Job 27:17

27:17 what he stores up ³  a righteous man will wear,

and an innocent man will inherit his silver.

Job 3:15

3:15 or with princes who possessed gold, ⁴ 

who filled their palaces ⁵  with silver.

Job 27:16

27:16 If he piles up silver like dust

and stores up clothing like mounds of clay,

Job 28:1

III. Job’s Search for Wisdom (28:1-28)

No Known Road to Wisdom ⁶ 

28:1 “Surely ⁷  there is a mine ⁸  for silver,

and a place where gold is refined. ⁹ 

Job 28:15

28:15 Fine gold cannot be given in exchange for it,

nor can its price be weighed out in silver.

Job 31:39

31:39 if I have eaten its produce without paying, ¹⁰ 

or caused the death ¹¹  of its owners, ¹² 

[22:25]  ¹ tn The form for “gold” here is plural, which could be a plural of extension. The LXX and Latin versions have “The Almighty will be your helper against your enemies.”

[22:25]  ² tn E. Dhorme (Job, 339) connects this word with an Arabic root meaning “to be elevated, steep.” From that he gets “heaps of silver.”

[27:17]  ³ tn The text simply repeats the verb from the last clause. It could be treated as a separate short clause: “He may store it up, but the righteous will wear it. But it also could be understood as the object of the following verb, “[what] he stores up the righteous will wear.” The LXX simply has, “All these things shall the righteous gain.”

[3:15]  ⁵ tn The expression simply has “or with princes gold to them.” The noun is defined by the noun clause serving as a relative clause (GKC 486 §155.e).

[3:15]  ⁶ tn Heb “filled their houses.” There is no reason here to take “houses” to mean tombs; the “houses” refer to the places the princes lived (i.e., palaces). The reference is not to the practice of burying treasures with the dead. It is simply saying that if Job had died he would have been with the rich and famous in death.

[28:1]  ⁷ sn As the book is now arranged, this chapter forms an additional speech by Job, although some argue that it comes from the writer of the book. The mood of the chapter is not despair, but wisdom; it anticipates the divine speeches in the end of the book. This poem, like many psalms in the Bible, has a refrain (vv. 12 and 20). These refrains outline the chapter, giving three sections: there is no known road to wisdom (1-11); no price can buy it (12-19); and only God has it, and only by revelation can man posses it (20-28).

[28:1]  ⁸ tn The poem opens with כִּי (ki). Some commentators think this should have been “for,” and that the poem once stood in another setting. But there are places in the Bible where this word occurs with the sense of “surely” and no other meaning (cf. Gen 18:20).

[28:1]  ⁹ tn The word מוֹצָא (motsa’, from יָצָא [yatsa’, “go out”]) is the word for “mine,” or more simply, “source.” Mining was not an enormous industry in the land of Canaan or Israel; mined products were imported. Some editors have suggested alternative readings: Dahood found in the word the root for “shine” and translated the MT as “smelter.” But that is going too far. P. Joüon suggested “place of finding,” reading מִמְצָא (mimtsa’) for מוֹצָא (motsa’; see Bib 11 [1930]: 323).

[28:1]  ¹⁰ tn The verb יָזֹקּוּ (yazoqqu) translated “refined,” comes from זָקַק (zaqaq), a word that basically means “to blow.” From the meaning “to blow; to distend; to inflate” derives the meaning for refining.

[31:39]  ⁹ tn Heb “without silver.”

[31:39]  ¹⁰ tc The versions have the verb “grieved” here. The Hebrew verb means “to breathe,” but the form is Hiphil. This verb in that stem could mean something of a contemptuous gesture, like “sniff” in Mal 1:13. But with נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh) in Job 11:20 it means “to cause death,” i.e., “to cause to breathe out; to expire.” This is likely the meaning here, although it is possible that it only meant “to cause suffering” to the people.

[31:39]  ¹¹ tn There is some debate over the meaning of בְּעָלֶיהָ (bÿ’aleyha), usually translated “its owners.” Dahood, following others (although without their emendations), thought it referred to “laborers” (see M. Dahood, Bib 41 [1960]: 303; idem, Bib 43 [1962]: 362).