Job 17:11-13

New English Translation

Footnotes

1. Job 17:11 tn This term usually means “plans; devices” in a bad sense, although it can be used of God’s plans (see e.g., Zech 8:15).
2. Job 17:11 tn Although not in the Hebrew text, “even” is supplied in the translation, because this line is in apposition to the preceding.
3. Job 17:11 tn This word has been linked to the root יָרַשׁ (yarash, “to inherit”) yielding a meaning “the possessions of my heart.” But it is actually to be connected to אָרַשׁ (ʾarash, “to desire”) cognate to the Akkadian eresu, “desire.” The LXX has “limbs,” which may come from an Aramaic word for “ropes.” An emendation based on the LXX would be risky.
4. Job 17:12 tn The verse simply has the plural, “they change.” But since this verse seems to be a description of his friends, a clarification of the referent in the translation is helpful.
5. Job 17:12 tn The same verb שִׂים (sim, “set”) is used this way in Isa 5:20: “…who change darkness into light.”
6. Job 17:12 tn The rest of the verse makes better sense if it is interpreted as what his friends say.
7. Job 17:12 tn This expression is open to alternative translations: (1) It could mean that they say in the face of darkness, “Light is near.” (2) It could also mean “The light is near the darkness” or “The light is nearer than the darkness.”
8. Job 17:13 tn The clause begins with אִם (ʾim) which here has more of the sense of “since.” E. Dhorme (Job, 253) takes a rather rare use of the word to get “Can I hope again” (see also GKC 475 §150.f for the caveat).