Job 12:24-25 New English Translation
24 He deprives the leaders of the earth[a]
of their understanding;[b]
he makes them wander
in a trackless desert waste.[c]
25 They grope about in darkness[d] without light;
he makes them stagger[e] like drunkards.
Footnotes
- Job 12:24 tn Heb “the heads of the people of the earth.”
- Job 12:24 tn Heb “heart.”
- Job 12:24 tn The text has בְּתֹהוּ לֹא־דָרֶךְ (betohu loʾ darekh): “in waste—no way,” or “in a wasteland [where there is] no way,” thus, “trackless” (see the discussion of negative attributes using לֹא [loʾ] in GKC 482 §152.u).
- Job 12:25 tn The word is an adverbial accusative.
- Job 12:25 tn The verb is the same that was in v. 24, “He makes them [the leaders still] wander” (the Hiphil of תָּעָה, taʿah). But in this passage some commentators emend the text to a Niphal of the verb and put it in the plural, to get the reading “they reel to and fro.” But even if the verse closes the chapter and there is no further need for a word of divine causation, the Hiphil sense works well here—causing people to wander like a drunken man would be the same as making them stagger.
New English Translation (NET)
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