Job 14:2-4

New English Translation

Footnotes

1. Job 14:2 tn Heb יָצָא (yatsaʾ, “comes forth”). The perfect verb expresses characteristic action and so is translated by the present tense (see GKC 329 §111.s).
2. Job 14:2 tn The verb וַיִּמָּל (vayyimmal) is from the root מָלַל (malal, “to languish; to wither”) and not from a different root מָלַל (malal, “to cut off”).
3. Job 14:2 tn The verb is “and he does not stand.” Here the verb means “to stay fixed; to abide.” The shadow does not stay fixed, but continues to advance toward darkness.
4. Job 14:3 tn Heb “open the eye on,” an idiom meaning to prepare to judge someone.
5. Job 14:3 tn The verse opens with אַף־עַל־זֶה (ʾaf ʿal zeh), meaning “even on such a one!” It is an exclamation of surprise.
6. Job 14:3 tn The text clearly has “me” as the accusative, but many wish to emend it to say “him” (אֹתוֹ, ʾoto). But D. J. A. Clines rightly rejects this in view of the way Job is written, often moving back and forth between his own tragedy and others’ tragedies (Job [WBC], 283).
7. Job 14:4 tn The expression is מִי־יִתֵּן (mi yitten, “who will give”; see GKC 477 §151.b). Some commentators (H. H. Rowley and A. B. Davidson) wish to take this as the optative formula: “O that a clean might come out of an unclean!” But that does not fit the verse very well, and still requires the addition of a verb. The exclamation here simply implies something impossible—man is unable to attain purity.
8. Job 14:4 sn The point being made is that the entire human race is contaminated by sin, and therefore cannot produce something pure. In this context, since man is born of woman, it is saying that the woman and the man who is brought forth from her are impure. See Ps 51:5; Isa 6:5; Gen 6:5.