Job 31:33-35

New English Translation

Footnotes

1. Job 31:33 tn Now the protasis continues again.
2. Job 31:33 sn Some commentators suggest taking the meaning here to be “as Adam,” referring to the Paradise story of the sin and denial.
3. Job 31:33 tn The infinitive is epexegetical, explaining the first line.
4. Job 31:33 tn The MT has “in my bosom.” This is the only place in the OT where this word is found. But its meaning is well attested from Aramaic.
5. Job 31:34 tn Here too the verb will be the customary imperfect—it explains what he continually did in past time.
6. Job 31:34 tn Heb “the great multitude.” But some commentators take רַבָּה (rabbah) adverbially: “greatly” (see RSV).
7. Job 31:35 tn The optative is again introduced with “who will give to me hearing me?”—“O that someone would listen to me!”
8. Job 31:35 tn Heb “here is my ‘tav’” (הֵן תָּוִי, hen tavi). The letter ת (tav) is the last letter of the alphabet in Hebrew. In paleo-Hebrew the letter was in the form of a cross or an “X,” and so used for one making a mark or a signature. In this case Job has signed his statement and delivered it to the court—but he has yet to be charged. Kissane thought that this being the last letter of the alphabet, Job was saying, “This is my last word.” Others take the word to mean “desire”—“this is my desire, that God would answer me” (see E. F. Sutcliffe, “Notes on Job, textual and exegetical,” Bib 30 [1949]: 71-72; G. R. Driver, “Problems in Job,” AJSL 52 [1935/36]: 166; P. P. Saydon, “Philological and Textual Notes to the Maltese Translation of the Old Testament,” CBQ 23 [1961]: 252). R. Gordis (Job, 355) also argues strongly for this view.
9. Job 31:35 tn Heb “a scroll,” in the context referring to a scroll containing the accusations of Job’s legal adversary (see the next line).
10. Job 31:35 tn The last line is very difficult; it simply says, “a scroll [that] my [legal] adversary had written.” The simplest way to handle this is to see it as a continuation of the optative (RSV).