Job 13 - New English Translation (NET)

Job Pleads His Cause to God^[a]

13 “Indeed, my eyes have seen all this,^[b]
my ears have heard and understood it.
² What you know,^[c] I^[d] know also;
I am not inferior^[e] to you!
³ But I wish to speak^[f] to the Almighty,^[g]
and I desire to argue^[h] my case^[i] with God.
⁴ But you, however, are inventors of lies;^[j]
all of you are worthless physicians!^[k]
5 If only you would keep completely silent!^[l]
For you, that would be wisdom.^[m]
6 “Listen now to my argument,^[n]
and be attentive to my lips’ contentions.^[o]
7 Will you speak wickedly^[p] on God’s behalf?^[q]
Will you speak deceitfully for him?
⁸ Will you show him partiality?^[r]
Will you argue the case^[s] for God?
⁹ Would it turn out well if he would examine^[t] you?
Or as one deceives^[u] a man would you deceive him?
¹⁰ He would certainly rebuke^[v] you
if you secretly^[w] showed partiality.
¹¹ Would not his splendor^[x] terrify^[y] you
and the fear he inspires^[z] fall on you?
¹² Your maxims^[aa] are proverbs of ashes;^[ab]
your defenses^[ac] are defenses of clay.^[ad]
13 “Refrain from talking^[ae] with me so that^[af] I may speak;

then let come to me^[ag] what may.^[ah]
14 Why^[ai] do I put myself in peril,^[aj]
and take my life in my hands?
¹⁵ Even if he slays me, I will hope in him;^[ak]
I will surely^[al] defend^[am] my ways to his face.
¹⁶ Moreover, this will become my deliverance,
for no godless person would come before him.^[an]
17 Listen carefully^[ao] to my words;
let your ears be attentive to my explanation.^[ap]
18 See now,^[aq] I have prepared^[ar] my^[as] case;^[at]
I know that I am right.^[au]
19 Who^[av] will contend with me?
If anyone can, I will be silent and die.^[aw]
20 Only in two things spare me,^[ax] O God,^[ay]
and then I will not hide from your face:
²¹ Remove^[az] your hand^[ba] far from me
and stop making me afraid with your terror.^[bb]
22 Then call,^[bc] and I will answer,
or I will speak, and you respond to me.
²³ How many are my^[bd] iniquities and sins?
Show me my transgression and my sin.^[be]
24 Why do you hide your face^[bf]
and regard me as your enemy?
²⁵ Do you wish to torment^[bg] a windblown^[bh] leaf
and chase after dry chaff?^[bi]
26 For you write down^[bj] bitter things against me
and cause me to inherit the sins of my youth.^[bk]
27 And you put my feet in the stocks^[bl]
and you watch all my movements;^[bm]
you put marks^[bn] on the soles of my feet.
²⁸ So I^[bo] waste away like something rotten,^[bp]
like a garment eaten by moths.

Footnotes

1. Job 13:1 sn Chapter 13 records Job’s charges against his friends for the way they used their knowledge (1-5), his warning that God would find out their insincerity (6-12), and his pleading of his case to God in which he begs for God to remove his hand from him and that he would not terrify him with his majesty and that he would reveal the sins that caused such great suffering (13-28).
2. Job 13:1 tn Hebrew has כֹּל (kol, “all”); there is no reason to add anything to the text to gain a meaning “all this.”
3. Job 13:2 tn Heb “Like your knowledge”; in other words Job is saying that his knowledge is like their knowledge.
4. Job 13:2 tn The pronoun makes the subject emphatic and stresses the contrast: “I know—I also.”
5. Job 13:2 tn The verb “fall” is used here as it was in Job 4:13 to express becoming lower than someone, i.e., inferior.
6. Job 13:3 tn The verb is simply the Piel imperfect אֲדַבֵּר (ʾadabber, “I speak”). It should be classified as a desiderative imperfect, saying, “I desire to speak.” This is reinforced with the verb “to wish, desire” in the second half of the verse.
7. Job 13:3 tn The Hebrew title for God here is אֶל־שַׁדַּי (ʾel shadday, “El Shaddai”).
8. Job 13:3 tn The infinitive absolute functions here as the direct object of the verb “desire” (see GKC 340 §113.b).
9. Job 13:3 tn The infinitive הוֹכֵחַ (hokheakh) is from the verb יָכַח (yakhakh), which means “to argue, plead, debate.” It has the legal sense here of arguing a case (cf. 5:17).
10. Job 13:4 tn The טֹפְלֵי־שָׁקֶר (tof^ele shaqer) are “plasterers of lies” (Ps 119:69). The verb means “to coat, smear, plaster.” The idea is that of imputing something that is not true. Job is saying that his friends are inventors of lies. The LXX was influenced by the next line and came up with “false physicians.”
11. Job 13:4 tn The literal rendering of the construct would be “healers of worthlessness.” Ewald and Dillmann translated it “patchers” based on a meaning in Arabic and Ethiopic; this would give the idea “botchers.” But it makes equally good sense to take “healers” as the meaning, for Job’s friends came to minister comfort and restoration to him—but they failed. See P. Humbert, “Maladie et medicine dans l’AT,” RHPR 44 (1964): 1-29.
12. Job 13:5 tn The construction is the imperfect verb in the wish formula preceded by the infinitive that intensifies it. The Hiphil is not directly causative here, but internally—“keep silent.”
13. Job 13:5 tn Heb “and it would be for you for wisdom,” or “that it would become your wisdom.” Job is rather sarcastic here, indicating if they shut up they would prove themselves to be wise (see Prov 17:28).
14. Job 13:6 sn Job first will argue with his friends. His case that he will plead with God begins in v. 13. The same root יָכַח (yakhakh, “argue, plead”) is used here as in v. 3b (see note). Synonymous parallelism between the two halves of this verse supports this translation.
15. Job 13:6 tn The Hebrew word רִבוֹת (rivot, “disputes, contentions”) continues the imagery of presenting a legal case. The term is used of legal disputations and litigation. See, also, v. 19a.
16. Job 13:7 tn Heb “speak iniquity.” The form functions adverbially. The noun עַוְלָה (ʿavlah) means “perversion; injustice; iniquity; falsehood.” Here it is parallel to רְמִיָּה (r^emiyyah, “fraud; deceit; treachery”).
17. Job 13:7 tn The expression “for God” means “in favor of God” or “on God’s behalf.” Job is amazed that they will say false things on God’s behalf.
18. Job 13:8 sn The idiom used here is “Will you lift up his face?” Here Job is being very sarcastic, for this expression usually means that a judge is taking a bribe. Job is accusing them of taking God’s side.
19. Job 13:8 tn The same root is used here (רִיב, riv, “dispute, contention”) as in v. 6b (see note).
20. Job 13:9 tn The verb חָפַר (khafar) means “to search out, investigate, examine.” In the conditional clause the imperfect verb expresses the hypothetical case.
21. Job 13:9 tn Both the infinitive and the imperfect of תָּלַל (talal, “deceive, mock”) retain the ה (he) (GKC 148 §53.q). But for the alternate form, see F. C. Fensham, “The Stem HTL in Hebrew,” VT 9 (1959): 310-11. The infinitive is used here in an adverbial sense after the preposition.
22. Job 13:10 tn The verbal idea is intensified with the infinitive absolute. This is the same verb used in v. 3; here it would have the sense of “rebuke, convict.”sn Peake’s observation is worth noting, namely, that as Job attacks the unrighteousness of God boldly he nonetheless has confidence in God’s righteousness that would not allow liars to defend him.
23. Job 13:10 sn The use of the word “in secret” or “secretly” suggests that what they do is a guilty action (31:27a).
24. Job 13:11 sn The word translated “his majesty” or “his splendor” (שְׂאֵתוֹ, s^eʾeto) forms a play on the word “show partiality” (תִּשָּׂאוּן, tissaʾun) in the last verse. They are both from the verb נָשַׂא (nasaʾ, “to lift up”).
25. Job 13:11 tn On this verb in the Piel, see 7:14.
26. Job 13:11 tn Heb “His dread”; the suffix is a subjective genitive.
27. Job 13:12 tn The word is זִכְרֹנֵיכֶם (zikhronekhem, “your remembrances”). The word זִכָּרֹן (zikkaron) not only can mean the act of remembering, but also what is remembered—what provokes memory or is worth being remembered. In the plural it can mean all the memorabilia, and in this verse all the sayings and teachings. H. H. Rowley (Job [NCBC], 99) suggests that in Job’s speech it could mean “all your memorized sayings.”
28. Job 13:12 tn The parallelism of “dust” and “ashes” is fairly frequent in scripture. But “proverbs of ashes” is difficult. The genitive is certainly describing the proverbs; it could be classified as a genitive of apposition, proverbs that are/have become ashes. Ashes represent something that at one time may have been useful, but now has been reduced to what is worthless.
29. Job 13:12 tn There is a division of opinion on the source of this word. Some take it from “answer,” related to Arabic, Aramaic, and Syriac words for “answer,” and so translate it “responses” (JB). Others take it from a word for “back,” with a derived meaning of the “boss” of the shield, and translate it “bulwark” or “defenses” (NEB, RSV, NIV). The idea of “answers” may fit the parallelism better, but “defenses” can be taken figuratively to refer to verbal defenses.
30. Job 13:12 sn Any defense made with clay would crumble on impact.
31. Job 13:13 tn The Hebrew has a pregnant construction: “be silent from me,” meaning “stand away from me in silence,” or “refrain from talking with me.” See GKC 384 §119.ff. The LXX omits “from me,” as do several commentators.
32. Job 13:13 tn The verb is the Piel cohortative; following the imperative of the first colon this verb would show purpose or result. The inclusion of the independent personal pronoun makes the focus emphatic—“so that I (in my turn) may speak.”
33. Job 13:13 tn The verb עָבַר (ʿavar, “pass over”) is used with the preposition עַל (ʿal, “upon”) to express the advent of misfortune, namely, something coming against him.
34. Job 13:13 tn The interrogative pronoun מָה (mah) is used in indirect questions, here introducing a clause [with the verb understood] as the object—“whatever it be” (see GKC 443-44 §137.c).
35. Job 13:14 tc Most editors reject עַל־מָה (ʿal mah) as dittography from the last verse.
36. Job 13:14 tn Heb “why do I take my flesh in my teeth?” This expression occurs nowhere else. It seems to be drawn from animal imagery in which the wild beast seizes the prey and carries it off to a place of security. The idea would then be that Job may be destroying himself. An animal that fights with its flesh (prey) in its mouth risks losing it. Other commentators do not think this is satisfactory, but they are unable to suggest anything better.
37. Job 13:15 tn There is a textual difficulty here that factors into the interpretation of the verse. The Kethib is לֹא (loʾ, “not”), but the Qere is לוֹ (lo, “to him”). The RSV takes the former: “Behold, he will slay me, I have no hope.” The NIV takes it as “though he slay me, yet will I hope in him.” Job is looking ahead to death, which is not an evil thing to him. The point of the verse is that he is willing to challenge God at the risk of his life; and if God slays him, he is still confident that he will be vindicated—as he says later in this chapter. Other suggestions are not compelling. E. Dhorme (Job, 187) makes a slight change of אֲיַחֵל (ʾayakhel, “I will hope”) to אַחִיל (ʾakhil, “I will [not] tremble”). A. B. Davidson (Job, 98) retains the MT, but interprets the verb more in line with its use in the book: “I will not wait” (cf. NLT).
38. Job 13:15 tn On אַךְ (ʾakh, “surely”) see GKC 483 §153 on intensive clauses.
39. Job 13:15 tn The verb once again is יָכָה (yakhah, in the Hiphil, “argue a case, plead, defend, contest”). But because the word usually means “accuse” rather than “defend,” I. L. Seeligmann proposed changing “my ways” to “his ways” (“Zur Terminologie für das Gerichtsverfahren im Wortschatz des biblischen Hebräisch,” VTSup 16 [1967]: 251-78). But the word can be interpreted appropriately in the context without emendation.
40. Job 13:16 sn The fact that Job will dare to come before God and make his case is evidence—to Job at least—that he is innocent.
41. Job 13:17 tn The infinitive absolute intensifies the imperative, which serves here with the force of an immediate call to attention. In accordance with GKC 342 §113.n, the construction could be translated, “Keep listening” (so ESV).
42. Job 13:17 tn The verb has to be supplied in this line, for the MT has “and my explanation in your ears.” In the verse, both “word” and “explanation” are Aramaisms (the latter appearing in Dan 5:12 for the explanation of riddles).
43. Job 13:18 tn The particle הִנֵּה (hinneh) functions almost as an imperative here, calling attention to what follows: “look” (archaic: behold).
44. Job 13:18 tn The verb עָרַךְ (ʿarakh) means “to set in order, set in array [as a battle], prepare” in the sense here of arrange and organize a lawsuit.
45. Job 13:18 tn The pronoun is added because this is what the verse means.
46. Job 13:18 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).
47. Job 13:18 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.
48. Job 13:19 tn The interrogative is joined with the emphatic pronoun, stressing “who is he [who] will contend,” or more emphatically, “who in the world will contend.” Job is confident that no one can bring charges against him. He is certain of success.
49. Job 13:19 sn Job is confident that he will be vindicated. But if someone were to show up and have proof of sin against him, he would be silent and die (literally “keep silent and expire”).
50. Job 13:20 tn The line reads “do not do two things.”
51. Job 13:20 tn “God” is supplied to the verse, for the address is now to him. Job wishes to enter into dispute with God, but he first appeals that God not take advantage of him with his awesome power.
52. Job 13:21 tn The imperative הַרְחַק (harkhaq, “remove”; GKC 98 §29.q), from רָחַק (rakhaq, “far, be far”) means “take away [far away]; to remove.”
53. Job 13:21 sn This is a common, but bold, anthropomorphism. The fact that the word used is כַּף (kaf, properly “palm”) rather than יָד (yad, “hand,” with the sense of power) may stress Job’s feeling of being trapped or confined (see also Ps 139:5, 7).
54. Job 13:21 tn See Job 9:34.
55. Job 13:22 tn The imperatives in the verse function like the future tense in view of their use for instruction or advice. The chiastic arrangement of the verb forms is interesting: imperative + imperfect, imperfect + imperative. The imperative is used for God, but the imperfect is used when Job is the subject. Job is calling for the court to convene—he will be either the defendant or the prosecutor.
56. Job 13:23 tn The pronoun “my” is not in the Hebrew text, but has been supplied here in the translation.
57. Job 13:23 sn Job uses three words for sin here: “iniquities,” which means going astray, erring; “sins,” which means missing the mark or the way; and “transgressions,” which are open rebellions. They all emphasize different kinds of sins and different degrees of willfulness. Job is demanding that any sins be brought up. Both Job and his friends agree that great afflictions would have to indicate great offenses—he wants to know what they are.
58. Job 13:24 sn The anthropomorphism of “hide the face” indicates a withdrawal of favor and an outpouring of wrath (see Pss 27:9; 30:7 [8]; Isa 54:8). Sometimes God “hides his face” to make himself invisible or aloof (see 34:29). In either case, if God covers his face it is because he considers Job an enemy—at least this is what Job thinks.
59. Job 13:25 tn The verb תַּעֲרוֹץ (taʿarots, “you torment”) is from עָרַץ (ʿarats), which usually means “fear; dread,” but can also mean “to make afraid; to terrify” (Isa 2:19, 21). The imperfect is here taken as a desiderative imperfect: “why do you want to,” but it could also be a simple future: “will you torment.”
60. Job 13:25 tn The word נִדָּף (niddaf) is “driven” from the root נָדַף (nadaf, “drive”). The words “by the wind” or the interpretation “windblown” has to be added for the clarification. Job is comparing himself to this leaf (so an implied comparison, called hypocatastasis)—so light and insubstantial that it is amazing that God should come after him. Guillaume suggests that the word is not from this root, but from a second root נָדַף (nadaf), cognate to Arabic nadifa, “to dry up” (A. Guillaume, “A Note on Isaiah 19:7, ” JTS 14 [1963]: 382-83). But as D. J. A. Clines notes (Job [WBC], 283), a dried leaf is a driven leaf—a point Guillaume allows as he says there is ambiguity in the term.
61. Job 13:25 tn The word קַשׁ (qash) means “chaff; stubble,” or a wisp of straw. It is found in Job 41:20-21 for that which is so worthless and insignificant that it is hardly worth mentioning. If dried up or withered, it too will be blown away in the wind.
62. Job 13:26 tn The meaning is that of writing down a formal charge against someone (cf. Job 31:15).
63. Job 13:26 sn Job acknowledges sins in his youth, but they are trifling compared to the suffering he now endures. Job thinks it unjust of God to persecute him now for those—if that is what is happening.
64. Job 13:27 tn The word occurs here and in Job 33:11. It could be taken as “stocks,” in which the feet were held fast; or it could be “shackles,” which allowed the prisoner to move about. The parallelism favors the latter, if the two lines are meant to be referring to the same thing.
65. Job 13:27 tn The word means “ways; roads; paths,” but it is used here in the sense of the “way” in which one goes about his activities.
66. Job 13:27 tn The verb תִּתְחַקֶּה (titkhaqqeh) is a Hitpael from the root חָקָה (khaqah, parallel to חָקַק, khaqaq). The word means “to engrave” or “to carve out.” This Hitpael would mean “to imprint something on oneself” (E. Dhorme [Job, 192] says on one’s mind, and so derives the meaning “examine.”). The object of this is the expression “on the roots of my feet,” which would refer to where the feet hit the ground. Since the passage has more to do with God’s restricting Job’s movement, the translation “you set a boundary to the soles of my feet” would be better than Dhorme’s view. The image of inscribing or putting marks on the feet is not found elsewhere. It may be, as Pope suggests, a reference to marking the slaves to make tracking them easier. The LXX has “you have penetrated to my heels.”
67. Job 13:28 tn Heb “and he.” Some of the commentators move the verse and put it after Job 14:2, 3 or 6.
68. Job 13:28 tn The word רָקָב (raqav) is used elsewhere in the Bible of dry rot in a house, or rotting bones in a grave. It is used in parallelism with “moth” both here and in Hos 5:12. The LXX has “like a wineskin.” This would be from רֹקֶב (roqev, “wineskin”). This word does not occur in the Hebrew Bible, but is attested in Sir 43:20 and in Aramaic. The change is not necessary.