Job 6:30

6:30 Is there any falsehood ¹  on my lips?

Can my mouth ²  not discern evil things? ³ 

Job 13:18

13:18 See now, ⁴  I have prepared ⁵  my ⁶  case; ⁷ 

I know that I am right. ⁸ 

Job 20:2

20:2 “This is why ⁹  my troubled thoughts bring me back ¹⁰  –

because of my feelings ¹¹  within me.

[6:30]  ¹ tn The word עַוְלָה (’avlah) is repeated from the last verse. Here the focus is clearly on wickedness or injustice spoken.

[6:30]  ² tn Heb “my palate.” Here “palate” is used not so much for the organ of speech (by metonymy) as of discernment. In other words, what he says indicates what he thinks.

[6:30]  ³ tn The final word, הַוּוֹת (havvot) is usually understood as “calamities.” He would be asking if he could not discern his misfortune. But some argue that the word has to be understood in the parallelism to “wickedness” of words (D. J. A. Clines, Job [WBC], 162). Gordis connects it to Mic 7:3 and Ps 5:10 [9] where the meaning “deceit, falsehood” is found. The LXX has “and does not my throat meditate understanding?”

[13:18]  ⁴ tn The particle הִנֵּה (hinneh) functions almost as an imperative here, calling attention to what follows: “look” (archaic: behold).

[13:18]  ⁵ tn The verb עָרַךְ (’arakh) means “to set in order, set in array [as a battle], prepare” in the sense here of arrange and organize a lawsuit.

[13:18]  ⁶ tn The pronoun is added because this is what the verse means.

[13:18]  ⁷ tn The word מִשְׁפָּט (mishpat) usually means “judgment; decision.” Here it means “lawsuit” (and so a metonymy of effect gave rise to this usage; see Num 27:5; 2 Sam 15:4).

[13:18]  ⁸ tn The pronoun is emphatic before the verb: “I know that it is I who am right.” The verb means “to be right; to be righteous.” Some have translated it “vindicated,” looking at the outcome of the suit.

[20:2]  ⁷ tn The ordinary meaning of לָכֵן (lakhen) is “therefore,” coming after an argument. But at the beginning of a speech it is an allusion to what follows.

[20:2]  ⁸ tn The verb is שׁוּב (shuv, “to return”), but in the Hiphil, “bring me back,” i.e., prompt me to make another speech. The text makes good sense as it is, and there is no reason to change the reading to make a closer parallel with the second half – indeed, the second part explains the first.

[20:2]  ⁹ tn The word is normally taken from the root “to hasten,” and rendered “because of my haste within me.” But K&D 11:374 proposed another root, and similarly, but closer to the text, E. Dhorme (Job, 289-90) found an Arabic word with the meaning “feeling, sensation.” He argues that from this idea developed the meanings in the cognates of “thoughts” as well. Similarly, Gordis translates it “my feeling pain.” See also Eccl 2:25.