Job 29:20-22 New English Translation
Job’s Reputation
21 “People[c] listened to me and waited silently;[d]
they kept silent for my advice.
22 After I had spoken, they did not respond;
my words fell on them drop by drop.[e]
Footnotes
- Job 29:20 tn The word is “my glory,” meaning his high respect and his honor. Hoffmann proposed to read כִּידוֹן (kidon) instead, meaning “javelin” (as in 1 Sam 17:6), to match the parallelism (RQ 3 [1961/62]: 388). But the parallelism does not need to be so tight.
- Job 29:20 tn Heb “new.”
- Job 29:21 tn “People” is supplied; the verb is plural.
- Job 29:21 tc The last verb of the first half, “wait, hope,” and the first verb in the second colon, “be silent,” are usually reversed by the commentators (see G. R. Driver, “Problems in the Hebrew text of Job,” VTSup 3 [1955]: 86). But if “wait” has the idea of being silent as they wait for him to speak, then the second line would say they were silent for the reason of his advice. The reading of the MT is not impossible.
- Job 29:22 tn The verb simply means “dropped,” but this means like the rain. So the picture of his words falling on them like the gentle rain, drop by drop, is what is intended (see Deut 32:2).
New English Translation (NET)
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