Job 4:10-11

4:10 There is ¹  the roaring of the lion ² 

and the growling ³  of the young lion,

but the teeth of the young lions are broken. ⁴ 

4:11 The mighty lion ⁵  perishes ⁶  for lack of prey,

and the cubs of the lioness ⁷  are scattered.

Job 8:4

8:4 If ⁸  your children sinned against him,

he gave them over ⁹  to the penalty ¹⁰  of their sin.

Job 18:16-19

18:16 Below his roots dry up,

and his branches wither above.

18:17 His memory perishes from the earth,

he has no name in the land. ¹¹ 

18:18 He is driven ¹²  from light into darkness

and is banished from the world.

18:19 He has neither children nor descendants ¹³  among his people,

no survivor in those places he once stayed. ¹⁴ 

Job 27:14

27:14 If his children increase – it is for the sword! ¹⁵ 

His offspring never have enough to eat. ¹⁶ 

Exodus 20:5

20:5 You shall not bow down to them or serve them, ¹⁷  for I, the Lord, your God, am a jealous ¹⁸  God, responding to ¹⁹  the transgression of fathers by dealing with children to the third and fourth generations ²⁰  of those who reject me, ²¹ 

Psalms 109:9-15

109:9 May his children ²²  be fatherless,

and his wife a widow!

109:10 May his children ²³  roam around begging,

asking for handouts as they leave their ruined home! ²⁴ 

109:11 May the creditor seize ²⁵  all he owns!

May strangers loot his property! ²⁶ 

109:12 May no one show him kindness! ²⁷ 

May no one have compassion ²⁸  on his fatherless children!

109:13 May his descendants ²⁹  be cut off! ³⁰ 

May the memory of them be wiped out by the time the next generation arrives! ³¹ 

109:14 May his ancestors’ ³²  sins be remembered by the Lord!

May his mother’s sin not be forgotten! ³³ 

109:15 May the Lord be constantly aware of them, ³⁴ 

and cut off the memory of his children ³⁵  from the earth!

Psalms 119:155

119:155 The wicked have no chance for deliverance, ³⁶ 

for they do not seek your statutes.

Psalms 127:5

127:5 How blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them!

They will not be put to shame ³⁷  when they confront ³⁸  enemies at the city gate.

[4:10]  ¹ tn “There is” has been supplied to make a smoother translation out of the clauses.

[4:10]  ² sn Eliphaz takes up a new image here to make the point that the wicked are destroyed – the breaking up and scattering of a den of lions. There are several words for “lion” used in this section. D. J. A. Clines observes that it is probably impossible to distinguish them (Job [WBC], 109, 110, which records some bibliography of those who have tried to work on the etymologies and meanings). The first is אַרְיֵה (’aryeh) the generic term for “lion.” It is followed by שַׁחַל (shakhal) which, like כְּפִיר (kÿfir), is a “young lion.” Some have thought that the שַׁחַל (shakhal) is a lion-like animal, perhaps a panther or leopard. KBL takes it by metathesis from Arabic “young one.” The LXX for this verse has “the strength of the lion, and the voice of the lioness and the exulting cry of serpents are quenched.”

[4:10]  ³ tn Heb “voice.”

[4:10]  ⁴ tn The verb belongs to the subject “teeth” in this last colon; but it is used by zeugma (a figure of speech in which one word is made to refer to two or more other words, but has to be understood differently in the different contexts) of the three subjects (see H. H. Rowley, Job [NCBC], 46-47).

[4:11]  ⁵ tn The word לַיִשׁ (layish) traditionally rendered “strong lion,” occurs only here and in Prov 30:30 and Isa 30:6. It has cognates in several of the Semitic languages, and so seems to indicate lion as king of the beasts.

[4:11]  ⁶ tn The form of the verb is the Qal active participle; it stresses the characteristic action of the verb as if a standard universal truth.

[4:11]  ⁷ tn The text literally has “sons of the lioness.”

[8:4]  ⁸ tn The AV and RV take the protasis down to the middle of v. 6. The LXX changes the “if” at the beginning of v. 5 to “then” and makes that verse the apodosis. If the apodosis comes in the second half of v. 4, then v. 4 would be a complete sentence (H. H. Rowley, Job [NCBC], 71; A. B. Davidson, Job, 60). The particle אִם (’im) has the sense of “since” in this section.

[8:4]  ⁹ tn The verb is a Piel preterite with a vav (ו) consecutive. The ו (vav) need not be translated if the second half of the verse is the apodosis of the first – since they sinned…he did this. The verb שִׁלֵּחַ (shilleakh) means “to expel; to thrust out” normally; here the sense of “deliver up” or “deliver over” fits the sentence well. The verse is saying that sin carries its own punishment, and so God merely delivered the young people over to it.

[8:4]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “into the hand of their rebellion.” The word “hand” often signifies “power.” The rebellious acts have the power to destroy, and so that is what happened – according to Bildad. Bildad’s point is that Job should learn from what happened to his family.

[18:17]  ¹¹ tn Heb “outside.” Cf. ESV, “in the street,” referring to absence from his community’s memory.

[18:18]  ¹² tn The verbs in this verse are plural; without the expressed subject they should be taken in the passive sense.

[18:19]  ¹³ tn The two words נִין (nin, “offspring”) and נֶכֶד (nekhed, “posterity”) are always together and form an alliteration. This is hard to capture in English, but some have tried: Moffatt had “son and scion,” and Tur-Sinai had “breed or brood.” But the words are best simply translated as “lineage and posterity” or as in the NIV “offspring or descendants.”

[18:19]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “in his sojournings.” The verb גּוּר (gur) means “to reside; to sojourn” temporarily, without land rights. Even this word has been selected to stress the temporary nature of his stay on earth.

[27:14]  ¹⁵ tn R. Gordis (Job, 294) identifies this as a breviloquence. Compare Ps 92:8 where the last two words also constitute the apodosis.

[27:14]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “will not be satisfied with bread/food.”

[20:5]  ¹⁷ tn The combination of these two verbs customarily refers to the worship of pagan deities (e.g., Deut 17:3: 30:17; Jer 8:2; see J. J. Stamm and M. E. Andrew, The Ten Commandments in Recent Research [SBT], 86). The first verb is לאֹ־תִשְׁתַּחֲוֶה (lo’ tishtakhaveh), now to be classified as a hishtaphel imperfect from חָוָה (khavah; BDB 1005 s.v. שׁחה), “to cause oneself to be low to the ground.” It is used of the true worship of God as well. The second verb is וְלֹא תָעָבְדֵם (vÿlo’ to’ovdem). The two could be taken as a hendiadys: “you will not prostrate yourself to serve them.” In an interesting side comment U. Cassuto (Exodus, 242) offers an explanation of the spelling of the second verb: he suggests that it was spelled with the qamets khatuf vowel to show contempt for pagan worship, as if their conduct does not even warrant a correct spelling of the word “serve.” Gesenius says that the forms like this are anomalous, but he wonders if they were pointed as if the verb was a Hophal with the meaning “you shall not allow yourself to be brought to worship them” (GKC 161 §60.b). But this is unlikely.

[20:5]  ¹⁸ sn The word “jealous” is the same word often translated “zeal” or “zealous.” The word describes a passionate intensity to protect or defend something that is jeopardized. The word can also have the sense of “envy,” but in that case the object is out of bounds. God’s zeal or jealousy is to protect his people or his institutions or his honor. Yahweh’s honor is bound up with the life of his people.

[20:5]  ¹⁹ tn Verses 5 and 6 are very concise, and the word פָּקַד (paqad) is difficult to translate. Often rendered “visiting,” it might here be rendered “dealing with” in a negative sense or “punishing,” but it describes positive attention in 13:19. When used of God, it essentially means that God intervenes in the lives of people for blessing or for cursing. Some would simply translate the participle here as “punishing” the children for the sins of the fathers (cf. Lev 18:25; Isa 26:21; Jer 29:32; 36:31; Hos 1:4; Amos 3:2). That is workable, but may not say enough. The verse may indicate that those who hate Yahweh and do not keep his commandments will repeat the sins their fathers committed and suffer for them. Deut 24:16 says that individuals will die for their own sins and not their father’s sins (see also Deut 7:10 and Ezek 18). It may have more to do with patterns of sin being repeated from generation to generation; if the sin and the guilt were not fully developed in the one generation, then left unchecked they would develop and continue in the next. But it may also indicate that the effects of the sins of the fathers will be experienced in the following generations, especially in the case of Israel as a national entity (U. Cassuto, Exodus, 243). God is showing here that his ethical character is displayed in how he deals with sin and righteousness, all of which he describes as giving strong motivation for loyalty to him and for avoiding idolatry. There is a justice at work in the dealings of God that is not present in the pagan world.

[20:5]  ²⁰ tn The Hebrew word for “generations” is not found in v. 5 or 6. The numbers are short for a longer expression, which is understood as part of the description of the children already mentioned (see Deut 7:9, where “generation” [דּוֹר, dor] is present and more necessary, since “children” have not been mentioned).

[20:5]  ²¹ tn This is an important qualification to the principle. The word rendered “reject” is often translated “hate” and carries with it the idea of defiantly rejecting and opposing God and his word. Such people are doomed to carry on the sins of their ancestors and bear guilt with them.

[109:9]  ²² tn Or “sons.”

[109:10]  ²³ tn Or “sons.”

[109:10]  ²⁴ tn Heb “and roaming, may his children roam and beg, and seek from their ruins.” Some, following the LXX, emend the term וְדָרְשׁוּ (vÿdoreshu, “and seek”) to יְגֹרְשׁוּ (yÿgoreshu; a Pual jussive, “may they be driven away” [see Job 30:5; cf. NIV, NRSV]), but דָּרַשׁ (darash) nicely parallels שִׁאֵלוּ (shi’elu, “and beg”) in the preceding line.

[109:11]  ²⁵ tn Heb “lay snares for” (see Ps 38:12).

[109:11]  ²⁶ tn Heb “the product of his labor.”

[109:12]  ²⁷ tn Heb “may there not be for him one who extends loyal love.”

[109:12]  ²⁸ tn Perhaps this refers to being generous (see Ps 37:21).

[109:13]  ²⁹ tn Or “offspring.”

[109:13]  ³⁰ sn On the expression cut off see Ps 37:28.

[109:13]  ³¹ tn Heb “in another generation may their name be wiped out.”

[109:14]  ³² tn Or “fathers’ sins.”

[109:14]  ³³ tn Heb “not be wiped out.”

[109:15]  ³⁴ tn Heb “may they [that is, the sins mentioned in v. 14] be before the Lord continually.”

[109:15]  ³⁵ tn Heb “their memory.” The plural pronominal suffix probably refers back to the children mentioned in v. 13, and for clarity this has been specified in the translation.

[119:155]  ³⁶ tn Heb “far from the wicked [is] deliverance.”

[127:5]  ³⁷ tn Being “put to shame” is here metonymic for being defeated, probably in a legal context, as the reference to the city gate suggests. One could be humiliated (Ps 69:12) or deprived of justice (Amos 5:12) at the gate, but with strong sons to defend the family interests this was less likely to happen.

[127:5]  ³⁸ tn Heb “speak with.”