Job 7:3-4

7:3 thus ¹  I have been made to inherit ² 

months of futility, ³ 

and nights of sorrow ⁴ 

have been appointed ⁵  to me.

7:4 If I lie down, I say, ⁶  ‘When will I arise?’,

and the night stretches on ⁷ 

and I toss and turn restlessly ⁸ 

until the day dawns.

Job 9:27-28

9:27 If I say, ⁹  ‘I will ¹⁰  forget my complaint,

I will change my expression ¹¹  and be cheerful,’ ¹² 

9:28 I dread ¹³  all my sufferings, ¹⁴ 

for ¹⁵  I know that you do not hold me blameless. ¹⁶ 

Psalms 6:6

6:6 I am exhausted as I groan;

all night long I drench my bed in tears; ¹⁷ 

my tears saturate the cushion beneath me. ¹⁸ 

Psalms 77:4

77:4 You held my eyelids open; ¹⁹ 

I was troubled and could not speak. ²⁰ 

[7:3]  ¹ tn “Thus” indicates a summary of vv. 1 and 2: like the soldier, the mercenary, and the slave, Job has labored through life and looks forward to death.

[7:3]  ² tn The form is the Hophal perfect of נָחַל (nakhal): “I have been made to inherit,” or more simply, “I have inherited.” The form occurs only here. The LXX must have confused the letters or sounds, a ו (vav) for the ן (nun), for it reads “I have endured.” As a passive the form technically has two accusatives (see GKC 388 §121.c). Job’s point is that his sufferings have been laid on him by another, and so he has inherited them.

[7:3]  ³ tn The word is שָׁוְא (shav’, “vanity, deception, nothingness, futility”). His whole life – marked here in months to show its brevity – has been futile. E. Dhorme (Job, 98) suggests the meaning “disillusionment,” explaining that it marks the deceptive nature of mortal life. The word describes life as hollow, insubstantial.

[7:3]  ⁴ tn “Sorrow” is עָמָל (’amal), used in 3:10. It denotes anxious toil, labor, troublesome effort. It may be that the verse expresses the idea that the nights are when the pains of his disease are felt the most. The months are completely wasted; the nights are agonizing.

[7:3]  ⁵ tn The verb is literally “they have appointed”; the form with no expressed subject is to be interpreted as a passive (GKC 460 §144.g). It is therefore not necessary to repoint the verb to make it passive. The word means “to number; to count,” and so “to determine; to allocate.”

[7:4]  ⁶ tn This is the main clause, and not part of the previous conditional clause; it is introduced by the conjunction אִם (’im) (see GKC 336 §112.gg).

[7:4]  ⁷ tn The verb מָדַד (madad) normally means “to measure,” and here in the Piel it has been given the sense of “to extend.” But this is not well attested and not widely accepted. There are many conjectural emendations. Of the most plausible one might mention the view of Gray, who changes מִדַּד (middad, Piel of מָדַּד) to מִדֵּי (midde, comprising the preposition מִן [min] plus the noun דַּי [day], meaning “as often as”): “as often as evening comes.” Dhorme, following the LXX to some extent, adds the word “day” after “when/if” and replaces מִדַּד (middad) with מָתַי (matay, “when”) to read “If I lie down, I say, ‘When comes the morning?’ If I rise up, I say, ‘How long till evening?’” The LXX, however, may be based more on a recollection of Deut 28:67. One can make just as strong a case for the reading adopted here, that the night seems to drag on (so also NIV).

[7:4]  ⁸ tn The Hebrew term נְדֻדִים (nÿdudim, “tossing”) refers to the restless tossing and turning of the sick man at night on his bed. The word is a hapax legomenon derived from the verb נָדַד (nadad, “to flee; to wander; to be restless”). The plural form here sums up the several parts of the actions (GKC 460 §144.f). E. Dhorme (Job, 99) argues that because it applies to both his waking hours and his sleepless nights, it may have more of the sense of wanderings of the mind. There is no doubt truth to the fact that the mind wanders in all this suffering; but there is no need to go beyond the contextually clear idea of the restlessness of the night.

[9:27]  ⁹ tn The construction here uses the infinitive construct with a pronominal suffix – “if my saying” is this, or “if I say.” For the conditional clause using אִם (’im) with a noun clause, see GKC 496 §159.u.

[9:27]  ¹⁰ tn The verbal form is a cohortative of resolve: “I will forget” or “I am determined to forget.” The same will be used in the second colon of the verse.

[9:27]  ¹¹ tn Heb “I will abandon my face,” i.e., change my expression. The construction here is unusual; G. R. Driver connected it to an Arabic word ‘adaba, “made agreeable” (IV), and so interpreted this line to mean “make my countenance pleasant” (“Problems in the Hebrew text of Job,” VTSup 3 [1955]: 76). M. Dahood found a Ugaritic root meaning “make, arrange” (“The Root ’zb II in Job,” JBL 78 [1959]: 303-9), and said, “I will arrange my face.” But see H. G. Williamson, “A Reconsideration of `azab II in Ugaritic,” ZAW 87 (1985): 74-85; Williamson shows it is probably not a legitimate cognate. D. J. A. Clines (Job [WBC], 219) observes that with all these suggestions there are too many homonyms for the root. The MT construction is still plausible.

[9:27]  ¹² tn In the Hiphil of בָּלַג (balag) corresponds to Arabic balija which means “to shine” and “to be merry.” The shining face would signify cheerfulness and smiling. It could be translated “and brighten [my face].”

[9:28]  ¹³ tn The word was used in Job 3:25; it has the idea of “dread, fear, tremble at.” The point here is that even if Job changes his appearance, he still dreads the sufferings, because he knows that God is treating him as a criminal.

[9:28]  ¹⁴ sn See Job 7:15; see also the translation by G. Perles, “I tremble in every nerve” (“The Fourteenth Edition of Gesenius-Buhl’s Dictionary,” JQR 18 [1905/06]: 383-90).

[9:28]  ¹⁵ tn The conjunction “for” is supplied in the translation.

[9:28]  ¹⁶ sn A. B. Davidson (Job, 73) appropriately notes that Job’s afflictions were the proof of his guilt in the estimation of God. If God held him innocent, he would remove the afflictions.

[6:6]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “I cause to swim through all the night my bed.”

[6:6]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “with my tears my bed I flood/melt.”

[77:4]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “you held fast the guards of my eyes.” The “guards of the eyes” apparently refers to his eyelids. The psalmist seems to be saying that God would not bring him relief, which would have allowed him to shut his eyes and get some sleep (see v. 2).

[77:4]  ²⁰ tn The imperfect is used in the second clause to emphasize that this was an ongoing condition in the past.