Job 39:27-30

39:27 Is it at your command ¹  that the eagle soars,

and builds its nest on high?

39:28 It lives on a rock and spends the night there,

on a rocky crag ²  and a fortress. ³ 

39:29 From there it spots ⁴  its prey, ⁵ 

its eyes gaze intently from a distance.

39:30 And its young ones devour the blood,

and where the dead carcasses ⁶  are,

there it is.”

Job 39:2

39:2 Do you count the months they must fulfill,

and do you know the time they give birth? ⁷ 

Job 1:1

I. The Prologue (1:1-2:13)

Job’s Good Life ⁸ 

1:1 ⁹ There was a man ¹⁰  in the land of Uz ¹¹  whose ¹²  name was Job. ¹³  And that man was pure ¹⁴  and upright, ¹⁵  one who feared God and turned away from evil. ¹⁶ 

Proverbs 23:5

23:5 When you gaze upon riches, ¹⁷  they are gone,

for they surely make wings for themselves,

and fly off into the sky like an eagle! ¹⁸ 

Jeremiah 4:13

4:13 Look! The enemy is approaching like gathering clouds. ¹⁹ 

The roar of his chariots is like that of a whirlwind. ²⁰ 

His horses move more swiftly than eagles.”

I cry out, ²¹  “We are doomed, ²²  for we will be destroyed!”

Lamentations 4:19

ק (Qof)

4:19 Those who pursued us were swifter

than eagles ²³  in the sky. ²⁴ 

They chased us over the mountains;

they ambushed us in the wilderness.

Habakkuk 1:8

1:8 Their horses are faster than leopards

and more alert ²⁵  than wolves in the desert. ²⁶ 

Their horses ²⁷  gallop, ²⁸ 

their horses come a great distance;

like a vulture ²⁹  they swoop down quickly to devour their prey. ³⁰ 

[39:27]  ¹ tn Heb “your mouth.”

[39:28]  ² tn Heb “upon the tooth of a rock.”

[39:28]  ³ tn The word could be taken as the predicate, but because of the conjunction it seems to be adding another description of the place of its nest.

[39:29]  ⁴ tn The word means “search,” but can be used for a wide range of matters, including spying.

[39:29]  ⁵ tn Heb “food.”

[39:30]  ⁶ tn The word חֲלָלִים (khalalim) designates someone who is fatally wounded, literally the “pierced one,” meaning anyone or thing that dies a violent death.

[39:2]  ⁷ tn Here the infinitive is again a substantive: “the time of their giving birth.”

[1:1]  ⁸ sn See N. C. Habel, “The Narrative Art of Job,” JSOT 27 (1983): 101-11; J. J. Owens, “Prologue and Epilogue,” RevExp 68 (1971): 457-67; and R. Polzin, “The Framework of the Book of Job,” Int 31 (1974): 182-200.

[1:1]  ⁹ sn The Book of Job is one of the major books of wisdom literature in the Bible. But it is a different kind of wisdom. Whereas the Book of Proverbs is a collection of the short wisdom sayings, Job is a thorough analysis of the relationship between suffering and divine justice put in a dramatic poetic form. There are a number of treatises on this subject in the ancient Near East, but none of them are as thorough and masterful as Job. See J. Gray, “The Book of Job in the Context of Near Eastern Literature,” ZAW 82 (1970): 251-69; S. N. Kramer, “Man and His God, A Sumerian Variation on the ‘Job’ Motif,” VTSup 3 (1953): 170-82. While the book has fascinated readers for ages, it is a difficult book, difficult to translate and difficult to study. Most of it is written in poetic parallelism. But it is often very cryptic, it is written with unusual grammatical constructions, and it makes use of a large number of very rare words. All this has led some scholars to question if it was originally written in Hebrew or some other related Semitic dialect or language first. There is no indication of who the author was. It is even possible that the work may have been refined over the years; but there is no evidence for this either. The book uses a variety of genres (laments, hymns, proverbs, and oracles) in the various speeches of the participants. This all adds to the richness of the material. And while it is a poetic drama using cycles of speeches, there is no reason to doubt that the events represented here do not go back to a real situation and preserve the various arguments. Several indications in the book would place Job’s dates in the time of the patriarchs. But the composition of the book, or at least its final form, may very well come from the first millennium, maybe in the time of the flowering of wisdom literature with Solomon. We have no way of knowing when the book was written, or when its revision was completed. But dating it late in the intertestamental period is ruled out by the appearance of translations and copies of it, notably bits of a Targum of Job in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Among the general works and commentaries, see A. Hurvitz, “The Date of the Prose Tale of Job Linguistically Reconsidered,” HTR 67 (1974): 17-34; R. H. Pfeiffer, “The Priority of Job over Isaiah 40-55,” JBL 46 (1927): 202ff. The book presents many valuable ideas on the subject of the suffering of the righteous. Ultimately it teaches that one must submit to the wisdom of the Creator. But it also indicates that the shallow answers of Job’s friends do not do justice to the issue. Their arguments that suffering is due to sin are true to a point, but they did not apply to Job. His protests sound angry and belligerent, but he held tenaciously to his integrity. His experience shows that it is possible to live a pure life and yet still suffer. He finally turns his plea to God, demanding a hearing. This he receives, of course, only to hear that God is sovereignly ruling the universe. Job can only submit to him. In the end God does not abandon his sufferer. For additional material, see G. L. Archer, The Book of Job; H. H. Rowley, “The Book of Job and Its Meaning,” BJRL 41 (1958/59): 167-207; J. A. Baker, The Book of Job; C. L. Feinberg, “The Book of Job,” BSac 91 (1934): 78-86; R. Polzin and D. Robertson, “Studies in the Book of Job,” Semeia 7 (Missoula: Scholars Press, 1977).

[1:1]  ¹⁰ tn The Hebrew construction is literally “a man was,” using אִישׁ הָיָה (’ish hayah) rather than a preterite first. This simply begins the narrative.

[1:1]  ¹¹ sn The term Uz occurs several times in the Bible: a son of Aram (Gen 10:23), a son of Nahor (Gen 22:21), and a descendant of Seir (Gen 36:28). If these are the clues to follow, the location would be north of Syria or south near Edom. The book tells how Job’s flocks were exposed to Chaldeans, the tribes between Syria and the Euphrates (1:17), and in another direction to attacks from the Sabeans (1:15). The most prominent man among his friends was from Teman, which was in Edom (2:11). Uz is also connected with Edom in Lamentations 4:21. The most plausible location, then, would be east of Israel and northeast of Edom, in what is now North Arabia. The LXX has “on the borders of Edom and Arabia.” An early Christian tradition placed his home in an area about 40 miles south of Damascus, in Baashan at the southeast foot of Hermon.

[1:1]  ¹² tn In Hebrew the defining relative clause (“whose name was Job”) is actually an asyndetic verbless noun-clause placed in apposition to the substantive (“a man”); see GKC 486 §155.e.

[1:1]  ¹³ sn The name “Job” is mentioned by Ezekiel as one of the greats in the past – Noah, Job, and Daniel (14:14). The suffering of Job was probably well known in the ancient world, and this name was clearly part of that tradition. There is little reason to try to determine the etymology and meaning of the name, since it may not be Hebrew. If it were Hebrew, it might mean something like “persecuted,” although some suggest “aggressor.” If Arabic it might have the significance of “the one who always returns to God.”

[1:1]  ¹⁴ tn The word תָּם (tam) has been translated “perfect” (so KJV, ASV). The verbal root תָּמַם (tamam) means “to be blameless, complete.” The word is found in Gen 25:27 where it describes Jacob as “even-tempered.” It also occurs in Ps 64:5 (64:4 ET) and Prov 29:10. The meaning is that a person or a thing is complete, perfect, flawless. It does not mean that he was sinless, but that he was wholeheartedly trying to please God, that he had integrity and was blameless before God.

[1:1]  ¹⁵ tn The word יָשָׁר (yashar, “upright”) is complementary to “blameless.” The idea is “upright, just,” and applies to his relationships with others (Ps 37:37 and 25:21).

[1:1]  ¹⁶ sn These two expressions indicate the outcome of Job’s character. “Fearing God” and “turning from evil” also express two correlative ideas in scripture; they signify his true piety – he had reverential fear of the Lord, meaning he was a truly devoted worshiper who shunned evil.

[23:5]  ¹⁷ tc The Kethib is הֲתָעוּף (hata’uf), “do your eyes fly [light] on it?” The Qere is the Hiphil, הֲתָעִיף (hata’if) “do you cause your eyes to fly on it?” But the line is difficult. The question may be indirect: If you cast your eyes on it, it is gone – when you think you are close, it slips away.

[23:5]  ¹⁸ sn This seventh saying warns people not to expend all their energy trying to get rich because riches are fleeting (cf. Instruction of Amememope, chap. 7, 9:10-11 which says, “they have made themselves wings like geese and have flown away to heaven”). In the ancient world the symbol of birds flying away signified fleeting wealth.

[4:13]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “he is coming up like clouds.” The words “The enemy” are supplied in the translation to identify the referent and the word “gathering” is supplied to try to convey the significance of the simile, i.e., that of quantity and of an approaching storm.

[4:13]  ²⁰ tn Heb “his chariots [are] like a whirlwind.” The words “roar” and “sound” are supplied in the translation to clarify the significance of the simile.

[4:13]  ²¹ tn The words “I cry out” are not in the text, but the words that follow are obviously not the Lord’s. They are either those of the people or of Jeremiah. Taking them as Jeremiah’s parallels the interjection of Jeremiah’s response in 4:10 which is formally introduced.

[4:13]  ²² tn Heb “Woe to us!” The words “woe to” are common in funeral laments and at the beginning of oracles of judgment. In many contexts they carry the connotation of hopelessness or apprehensiveness of inevitable doom.

[4:19]  ²³ tn The bird referred to here could be one of several species of eagles, but more likely is the griffin-vulture (cf. NEB “vultures”). However, because eagles are more commonly associated with swiftness than vultures in contemporary English, “eagles” was used in the translation.

[4:19]  ²⁴ tn Or “in the heavens.” The Hebrew term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) may be translated “heaven(s)” or “sky” depending on the context.

[1:8]  ²⁵ tn Heb “sharper,” in the sense of “keener” or “more alert.” Some translate “quicker” on the basis of the parallelism with the first line (see HALOT 291 s.v. חדד).

[1:8]  ²⁶ tn Heb “wolves of the evening,” that is, wolves that prowl at night. The present translation assumes an emendation to עֲרָבָה (’aravah, “desert”). On this phrase see also Zeph 3:3.

[1:8]  ²⁷ tn Or “horsemen,” “cavalry.”

[1:8]  ²⁸ tn The precise nuance of the rare verb פָּוַשׁ (parash) is unclear here. Elsewhere it is used of animals jumping or leaping (see Jer 50:11; Mal 4:2).

[1:8]  ²⁹ tn Or “eagle” (so NASB, NRSV). The term can refer to either eagles or vultures, but in this context of gruesome destruction and death “vulture” is preferred.

[1:8]  ³⁰ tn Heb “they fly like a vulture/an eagle quickly to devour.” The direct object “their prey” is not included in the Hebrew text but is implied, and has been supplied in the translation for clarity.