Job 16:5-7

New English Translation

Footnotes

1. Job 16:5 tn “But” has been added in the translation to strengthen the contrast.
2. Job 16:5 tn The Piel of אָמַץ (ʾamats) means “to strengthen, fortify.”
3. Job 16:5 tn Heb “my mouth.”
4. Job 16:5 tn The verb יַחְשֹׂךְ (yakhsokh) means “to restrain; to withhold.” There is no object, so many make it first person subject, “I will not restrain.” The LXX and the Syriac have a different person—“I would not restrain.” G. R. Driver, arguing that the verb is intransitive here, made it “the solace of my lips would not [added] be withheld” (see JTS 34 [1933]: 380). D. J. A. Clines says that what is definitive is the use of the verb in the next line, where it clearly means “soothed, assuaged.”
5. Job 16:6 tn “But” is supplied in the translation to strengthen the contrast.
6. Job 16:6 tn The Niphal יֵחָשֵׂךְ (yekhasekh) means “to be soothed; to be assuaged.”
7. Job 16:6 tn Some argue that מָה (mah) in the text is the Arabic ma, the simple negative. This would then mean “it does not depart far from me.” The interrogative used rhetorically amounts to the same thing, however, so the suggestion is not necessary.
8. Job 16:7 tn In poetic discourse there is often an abrupt change from one person to another. See GKC 462 §144.p. Some take the subject of this verb to be God, others the pain (“surely now it has worn me out”).