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Job 11

The TorahRooted Bible (TRB), translated directly from the Hebrew and Greek.

Zophar speaks: Eloah is beyond searching out

1 Then Zophar the Naamathite answered and said:

2 Should a multitude of words go unanswered, and should a man full of talk be vindicated? 3 Should your boasting make men fall silent? When you mock, shall no one put you to shame? 4 For you have said, "My teaching is pure, and I am clean in Your eyes." 5 But oh, that Eloah would speak, and open His lips against you, 6 and declare to you the secrets of wisdom, for true wisdom has two sides! Know then that Eloah exacts of you less than your iniquity deserves.

7 Can you find out the deep things of Eloah? Can you find out the limit of Shaddai? 8 It is higher than the heavens; what can you do? Deeper than Sheol; what can you know? 9 Its measure is longer than the earth and broader than the sea. 10 If He passes by and imprisons, and calls to judgment, who can turn Him back? 11 For He knows worthless men; when He sees iniquity, will He not take note of it? 12 But a hollow man will gain understanding when a wild donkey's colt is born a man.

If you put iniquity away

13 If you set your heart aright, and stretch out your hands toward Him, 14 if iniquity is in your hand, put it far away, and let not injustice dwell in your tents; 15 then indeed you will lift up your face without blemish; you will be firm, and will not fear. 16 For you will forget your trouble; you will remember it as waters that have passed by. 17 Your life will rise brighter than the noonday; its darkness will be like the morning. 18 And you will trust, because there is hope; you will look around, and lie down in safety. 19 You will lie down, and none will make you afraid; and many will seek your favor. 20 But the eyes of the wicked will fail; refuge will perish from them, and their hope is to breathe their last.

Notes

  • 11:1 Zophar, the third friend (2:11), now speaks for the first time; what the note at 4:1 says about the friends' speeches holds for his as well. He is the bluntest of the three: where Eliphaz and Bildad hinted that Job must have sinned, Zophar says that Job deserves even worse than he has received (verse 6).
  • 11:6 The last line is literally "Eloah causes to be forgotten for you some of your iniquity": in Zophar's eyes Job has received less punishment than his sins deserve. "Two sides" is literally "double"; the sense is debated, perhaps that true wisdom has a hidden side beyond what Job can see.
  • 11:8 Sheol is the realm of the dead (see the note at 7:9), here the lowest depth set against the highest heavens. With the earth and the sea in verse 9, Zophar measures all four reaches of creation and finds Eloah's wisdom greater than them all.
  • 11:12 This sounds like a proverb, with a play on sounds in the Hebrew (navuv, "hollow," and yillavev, "gain heart," that is, understanding). The point is that an empty-headed man is as unlikely to become wise as a wild donkey is to be born human, and Zophar seems to aim it at Job.

Job 10 · Job 12

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