Job 2:8

Job took a shard of broken pottery to scrape ¹  himself ²  with while he was sitting ³  among the ashes. ⁴ 

biblegateway Job 2:8

Then Job took a piece of broken pottery and scraped himself with it as he sat among the ashes.

biblegateway Job 2:8

And he took a potsherd to scrape himself while he was sitting among the ashes.

biblegateway Job 2:8

Then Job scraped his skin with a piece of broken pottery as he sat among the ashes.

biblegateway Job 2:8

They itched and oozed so badly that he took a piece of broken pottery to scrape himself, then went and sat on a trash heap, among the ashes.

SABDAweb Job 2:8

And he took a broken bit of a pot, and, seated in the dust, was rubbing himself with the sharp edge of it.

bibleoremus Job 2:8

Job took a potsherd with which to scrape himself, and sat among the ashes.

biblegateway Job 2:8

And he took for himself a potsherd with which to scrape himself while he sat in the midst of the ashes.

biblegateway Job 2:8

Job took a shard of broken pottery to scrape ¹  himself ²  with while he was sitting ³  among the ashes. ⁴ 

¹ tn The verb גָּרַד (garad) is a hapax legomenon (only occurring here). Modern Hebrew has retained a meaning “to scrape,” which is what the cognate Syriac and Arabic indicate. In the Hitpael it would mean “scrape himself.”

² sn The disease required constant attention. The infection and pus had to be scraped away with a piece of broken pottery in order to prevent the spread of the infection. The skin was so disfigured that even his friends did not recognize him (2:12). The book will add that the disease afflicted him inwardly, giving him a foul breath and a loathsome smell (19:17, 20). The sores bred worms; they opened and ran, and closed and tightened (16:8). He was tormented with dreams (7:14). He felt like he was choking (7:14). His bones were racked with burning pain (30:30). And he was not able to rise from his place (19:18). The disease was incurable; but it would last for years, leaving the patient longing for death.

³ tn The construction uses the disjunctive vav (ו) with the independent pronoun with the active participle. The construction connects this clause with what has just been said, making this a circumstantial clause.

⁴ sn Among the ashes. It is likely that the “ashes” refers to the place outside the city where the rubbish was collected and burnt, i.e., the ash-heap (cf. CEV). This is the understanding of the LXX, which reads “dung-hill outside the city.”