Job 3:10

3:10 because it ¹  did not shut the doors ²  of my mother’s womb on me, ³ 

nor did it hide trouble ⁴  from my eyes!

Job 31:32

31:32 But ⁵  no stranger had to spend the night outside,

for I opened my doors to the traveler ⁶  –

Job 41:14

41:14 Who can open the doors of its mouth? ⁷ 

Its teeth all around are fearsome.

[3:10]  ¹ tn The subject is still “that night.” Here, at the end of this first section, Job finally expresses the crime of that night – it did not hinder his birth.

[3:10]  ² sn This use of doors for the womb forms an implied comparison; the night should have hindered conception (see Gen 20:18 and 1 Sam 1:5).

[3:10]  ³ tn The Hebrew has simply “my belly [= womb].” The suffix on the noun must be objective – it was the womb of Job’s mother in which he lay before his birth. See however N. C. Habel, “The Dative Suffix in Job 33:13,” Bib 63 (1982): 258-59, who thinks it is deliberately ambiguous.

[3:10]  ⁴ tn The word עָמָל (’amal) means “work, heavy labor, agonizing labor, struggle” with the idea of fatigue and pain.

[31:32]  ⁵ tn This verse forms another parenthesis. Job stops almost at every point now in the conditional clauses to affirm his purity and integrity.

[31:32]  ⁶ tn The word in the MT, אֹרחַ (’orakh, “way”), is a contraction from אֹרֵחַ (’oreakh, “wayfarer”); thus, “traveler.” The same parallelism is found in Jer 14:8. The reading here “on/to the road” is meaningless otherwise.

[41:14]  ⁹ tn Heb “his face.”