Job 9:12

9:12 If he snatches away, ¹  who can turn him back? ² 

Who dares to say to him, ‘What are you doing?’

Job 18:4

18:4 You who tear yourself ³  to pieces in your anger,

will the earth be abandoned ⁴  for your sake?

Or will a rock be moved from its place? ⁵ 

Isaiah 45:9

The Lord Gives a Warning

45:9 One who argues with his creator is in grave danger, ⁶ 

one who is like a mere ⁷  shard among the other shards on the ground!

The clay should not say to the potter, ⁸ 

“What in the world ⁹  are you doing?

Your work lacks skill!” ¹⁰ 

Romans 9:20

9:20 But who indeed are you – a mere human being ¹¹  – to talk back to God? ¹²  Does what is molded say to the molder, “Why have you made me like this?” ¹³ 

Romans 11:35

11:35 Or who has first given to God, ¹⁴ 

that God ¹⁵  needs to repay him? ¹⁶ 

[9:12]  ¹ tn E. Dhorme (Job, 133) surveys the usages and concludes that the verb חָתַף (khataf) normally describes the wicked actions of a man, especially by treachery or trickery against another. But a verb חָתַף (khataf) is found nowhere else; a noun “robber” is found in Prov 23:28. Dhorme sees no reason to emend the text, because he concludes that the two verbs are synonymous. Job is saying that if God acts like a plunderer, there is no one who can challenge what he does.

[9:12]  ² tn The verb is the Hiphil imperfect (potential again) from שׁוּב (shuv). In this stem it can mean “turn back, refute, repel” (BDB 999 s.v. Hiph.5).

[18:4]  ³ tn The construction uses the participle and then 3rd person suffixes: “O tearer of himself in his anger.” But it is clearly referring to Job, and so the direct second person pronouns should be used to make that clear. The LXX is an approximation or paraphrase here: “Anger has possessed you, for what if you should die – would under heaven be desolate, or shall the mountains be overthrown from their foundations?”

[18:4]  ⁴ tn There is a good deal of study on this word in this passage, and in Job in general. M. Dahood suggested a root עָזַב (’azav) meaning “to arrange; to rearrange” (“The Root ’zb II in Job,” JBL 78 [1959]: 303-9). But this is refuted by H. G. M. Williamson, “A Reconsideration of ’zb II in Biblical Hebrew,” ZAW 97 (1985): 74-85.

[18:4]  ⁵ sn Bildad is asking if Job thinks the whole moral order of the world should be interrupted for his sake, that he may escape the punishment for wickedness.

[45:9]  ⁶ tn Heb “Woe [to] the one who argues with the one who formed him.”

[45:9]  ⁷ tn The words “one who is like a mere” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons and clarification.

[45:9]  ⁸ tn Heb “Should the clay say to the one who forms it?” The rhetorical question anticipates a reply, “Of course not!”

[45:9]  ⁹ tn The words “in the world” are supplied in the translation to approximate in English idiom the force of the sarcastic question.

[45:9]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “your work, there are no hands for it,” i.e., “your work looks like something made by a person who has no hands.”

[9:20]  ¹¹ tn Grk “O man.”

[9:20]  ¹² tn Grk “On the contrary, O man, who are you to talk back to God?”

[9:20]  ¹³ sn A quotation from Isa 29:16; 45:9.

[11:35]  ¹⁴ tn Grk “him”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[11:35]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “he”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[11:35]  ¹⁶ sn A quotation from Job 41:11.