8 Yes, though his pride may mount to heaven's height, Who gazed upon him say-where is he gone. As a dream he flies, and is no longer found; Like a night spectre1o is he scared away. 9 The eye hath glanced" on him-it glanceth not again; 10 11 12 His children must appease1 the poor; And his own hands give back again his wealth. Ver. 4. Ha! The Hebrew in N is exclamatory it so, that apparitions from this spectral world departed very as well as interrogative. It is often so. Here it strikingly suddenly as though frightened, either by the crowing of the shows how impetuously Zophar dashes on after his hasty cock, or the appearance of morning, or something stern and exordium. The force of it is carried all through the high- bold in the human attitude towards such seeming intruders. wrought picture that follows. He begins as though he This is remarkably exemplified by the story Plutarch gives would overwhelm the unrepentant and presumptuous Job. us, in his life of Brutus (sect. xxxvi.), of the apparition (the Ver. 5. The triumph-the joy. These expres-nachtgesicht) that presented itself to him when reading in sions would seem to refer to Job's exultant hope, xix. 26, 27, and his warning, ver. 29. Ver. 7. As is his splendor. Ew.: nach seiner Grosse. The weight of authority is in favor of this rendering, as derived from the Arabic, 1, glory, splendor. The Chaldaic has the same meaning. It avoids the seemingly indecorous comparison of the E. V. rendering, and has, moreover, in its favor the fact that the Arabic word, thus used, is very common. It may be said, too, that the contrast thus given more strongly expresses the main idea, which is his great downfall. The suffix, too, as CONANT well remarks, is better adapted to this rendering. $ Ver. 7. Hopeless ruin. Literally, so he perishes utterly. does not mean forever in the time sense, but oply implies it in its real idea of completeness, finality. The verb suggests strongly that awful word Abaddon (1), the state of the lost. 10 Ver. 8. As a dream—As a night spectre. The rendering is demanded in order to give the true distinction of the words and in. The first is simply an ordinary dreaming, especially in a light sleep, which seems to fly away on opening the eyes (volucrique simillima somno), and we cannot recall it. We only know that we have been dreaming. So the wicked man, after his brief hallucination, cannot be found. Literally: They cannot find him. The other clause of the parallelism is much stronger. 'n denotes a vision as something different from such a mere dreaming. Again, it denotes the object of the vision, as well as the vision itself; like the Greek ois (from onтоμat, corresponding best to Heb.), which means the sight (spectaculum), as well as the seeing. This is generally something mysterious and sublime, as in Job iv. 13, or something frightful, as in Job vii. 14: "Thou scarest me with risions"--phantasms, spectres, frightful sights. The vision of Eliphaz (iv. 13-17), whatever degree of objective reality we may ascribe to it, is certainly evidence of a belief in a spectral world, from which came forth things to warn or to terrify men. The rendering spectre is strongly favored by the word following. The verb 1 is literally driven, chased away, as E. V. and CONANT render it, but scared away is most fitting to the context; and so the German commentators, such as UMBREIT, EWALD, ZÖCKLER, etc., mainly render it (verscheucht, fortgescheucht) weggescheucht. Everything about the passage shows that it was an ancient as well as a modern superstition, if we may call his tent at midnight before the battle of Philippi. "Whilst in deep study, he seemed to feel the presence of something entering. Turning his eye, he sees a strange and fearful form of something expúλov (belonging to no known species), standing in silence by him. Who art thou, man or god? The phantasm replies, in a hollow tone, I am thy evil genius, Brutus; thou shalt see me at Philippi. I will see thee there, said he." This bold answer of Brutus, as though making an appointment, and the fright of the spectre, is most admirably paraphrased by Cowley: I'll see thee there, saidst thou, With such a voice and such a brow, Come marching up the eastern hill afar. So flies the wicked man, scared away, driven away, by the divine judgments, or when the light of truth is let into his soul. The rendering, chased away, also reminds us of Prov. xiv. 32: “The wicked man is driven away in his wickedness.” This kind of language has a number of examples in Job, and it may be taken as proof that the phraseology in the Proverbs is derived from it. 11 Ver. 9. Hath glanced. . A word rare, but clear. Cant. i. 6: "The sun hath looked upon me"-to change my color. Job xxviii. 7: "The keen falcon's eye hath glanced upon it"-the miner's unexplored path. ZöckLER gives this very strikingly: ein Auge hat auf ihn geblickt, es thut's nicht wieder. Nothing could more distinctly express the idea of transitoriness: one glance, and he is never seen again. 12 Ver. 10. Must appease. This is the rendering of E. V. (seek to please). The argument for it, besides the grammatical one, is the harmony it makes with the second clause. The other rendering, the poor shall oppress his children, demands a new form of the verb 77-737. T 18 Ver. 11. Sins in secret done. Literally secret things; but a comparison of Ps. xc. 8 shows at once the meaning. Many render it sins of youth. There is authority for it from the use of Dhy, Ps. lxxxix. 46; Job xxxiii. 25, etc., but the general sense here is best, especially as it may also include the other, and perhaps point to them. Secret sins, or sins of youth-the effects of them go with a man to his grave. They lie down; ; singular feminine, but answers for a collective nominative, like a Greek singular verb with a plural neuter to which the Hebrew feminine, in such cases, corresponds. coming to the laborer or to his employer. There being no personal suffix, it must be taken generally as the toil, the wages of the wronged toiler, and therefore the word in brackets is simply the complement of the intended idea. The second clause has occasioned some difficulty. ' is certainly construct (wealth of exchange), and therefore the rendering of E. V. cannot be sustained, or that of UMBREIT, who would arbitrarily regard it as absolute. The construction, however, may be explained in two ways: 1. By regarding the second as connecting the clause with ; the first 1 making a subordinate connection reading thus: Restores the fruit of toil, and does not swallow it as the wealth of his exchange, and does not enjoy it.' This makes the two clauses so closely inter-dependent as to form one in fact-a construction which is not according to the usual style of the parallels in Job. 2. The second clause may be taken by itself, and thus rendered: It is as wealth of his exchange, and he does not enjoy. This is, indeed, very awkward English; but it gives the idea. The may possibly be taken as connecting by way of comparison, which is not unfrequently the case, especially in Proverbs; but a truer view is to regard it as connecting directly and phy", a verb and a verbal noun. Taking both as verbs, it would be: Wealth that he exchanges and does not enjoy; or taking both as nouns: Wealth of exchange, and not of enjoyment. "Wealth of restitution," SCHLOTTMAN well renders it. Better still would be wealth of retribution; and so it might have been given in our Metrical Version: 14 Ver. 17. On the fair rivers. here, and Judges v. 15, 16, is synonymous with, and means primarily artificial water conrses, but the word is used of rivers generally, as in Pa. lxv. 10, 15, the river of God. It is used to denote a beautiful, fair flowing stream, as represents a fuller and deeper one, or as the Latin amnis in distinction from flumen or fluvius. The flowing streams; literally, flowings of streams; the first noun qualifying the other-the full streams. Is anything special meant here, or is it only a glowing picture representing wealth and prosperity? The latter view seems easy, and is the one generally taken by commentators; but yet it has great difficulties. In the first place, the whole picture is not that of a poor man who never attains to any measure of luxury, but of one who has possessed, and then been deprived of it. In the second place, if Zephar has Job in view, s we must suppose from the way he brings in the picture, the language, thus understood, is wholly inapplicable. With his "seven thousand sheep and goats, and three thousand camels, and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she asses, and very many servants," he must be said to have seen "the brooks of honey and milk," that is, abundance of the luxuries of life, or of the good things of this world, if ever a man did. The conjecture may be hazarded, that the fervid and imaginative Zophar has in mind some early Arabian mythical paradise, something unearthly, or belonging to some remote region of the world, like the Greek "Isles of the Blessed." Thus viewed, it may have been the origin of that description we find so often in the Koran, and which must have been much older than the days of Mohammed. See Surat, ii. 23: "For them are the gardens where flow the rivers," etc., and many other places. In Surat xlvii. 16, 17, the language becomes almost identical, in some respects, with that of the passage in Job: "Like the garden promised to the pious, wherein are rivers of living water (water that never loses its purity), and rirers of milk whose taste never changes, and rivers of homey purified, and fruits of every kind, and forgiveness from their Lord." If Zophar had any such idea derived from any quarter, it may have resembled the Vedaic conception that MERX thinks of so much importance. See INT. THEISM, p. 15, 16. Why may not such a myth be regarded as having crossed the Indus, if it was there at that early period, or as having arisen from the imagination of the dwellers in Zophar's native land of Naama, y (the-because, etc.—therefore) although the connection is less land of delights), wherever that may have been. Such a fancied Paradise of sense would be immeasurably inferior to the scriptural idea of the Swns aiwriov, far inferior, we might say, to Job's vision of a reconciled God, with no other accompaniments. Wholly without God, as they are, it might be maintained, that such mythical representations, with all their "sweetness and light," have really less moral value than the bare hope of hearing, at some time, God's voice of deliverance from it (xiv. 15). Whatever may be thought of such a conjecture, the resemblance the passage bears to the Koranic language is certainly very striking. The latter may have been derived from it. Such is the opinion of Good, a commentator from whom much may be learned, notwithstanding his work is so marred by extravagant conceits and arbitrary changes of the Hebrew text. See Excursus I. of the Addenda. As wealth of retribution, not of joy; but it was thought best to keep the word exchange as not only more concise, but more distinctly preserving the figure. 16 Ver. 19. Because. The force of here, and as repeated in ver. 20, seems to extend to the strong apodotic expression, in the second clause of ver. 21. Such a carrying of the protasis through several parallel verses, has other examples in Job. See xv. 25-29, where commentators (EWALD, DILLMANN, ZÖCKLER, et al.) continue the protasis, through four verses (weil-weil-weil-deshalb). " is used there in the same way, and is rendered because (because clear, and there is no apodotic particle like ¡y (see note on the passage). Here translators generally break it up, or tervening clauses, although the demand for continuance is find subordinate apodoses, at the end, or in the middle of inmuch more clear than in the other passage, and the strong 12 y at end seems not to be satisfied with anything less. Thus the in ver. 19 covers its second clause. The repe- it is true, begins with N, which is an asserting particle, but that does not make it independent, or to be taken alone as the protasis to the following. The leaving out the copulative particles, and the omission of at the beginning of ver. 21 only makes it more forcible as the language of passion and impetuosity according to the rule of Aristotle, which 20 21 22 23 24 25 Seized" ruthlessly a house he would not build; 'Tis then God sends on him His burning storm of wrath, Does he flee from the iron lance ?22 The bow of brass shall pierce him through and through. He is gone." Terrors are over him. must hold true in all languages, that when the sense is clear without them, conjunctions had better be dispensed with. The translator has endeavored to preserve this asyndetic style, and, at the same time, to carry into the English the conciseness of the Hebrew. 17 Ver. 19. Seized ruthlessly. The rendering plunder misleads. It conveys the idea of robbing or despoiling a house of things that are in it. The more common as well as the primary sense of is here demanded, not only because it alone is applicable to a house, but because it gives the contrast wanted between the two ideas of violently taking possession, and of building for one's-self. The future (1)]') expresses not only that which objectively follows in time, but also what is subjectively consecutive, that is, in the order of the thought. In Greek and Latin the future is the mother of the subjective moods. In Hebrew, which is so destitute of modal forms, it is used for them. Had built, or builded not, a E. V. renders it after the Vulgate, will not do, because it makes a pluperfect or an objectively finished past prior in the order of the thought. 18 Ver. 20. Nor lets escape. may be regarded, like many other examples of Piel and Hiphil verbs, as permissive or preventive, as well as causal-let escape-make escape. Its future form is because it is consecutive in idea to the previous clause: He is so unquiet or unsatisfied that he lets not, or will not let-the rendering in English by the future, or the present, coming to the same thing. 19 Ver. 21. His good. Some such word as prosperity for 10 might seem more emphatic; but the simpler English word includes it and more. There is intended his summum bonum, or what seems such to the bad man. Therefore his GOOD shall not endure. It sounds like a sentence of judgment, after the arraignment in the previous items. If it is not too cruel a supposition, we may regard the angry yet eloquent Zophar as having Job in view, as though, at every item, he pointed to him as he sat in the ashes, intimating that he is the man: It must be that he had done some most wicked and oppressive acts, crushed the poor-seized a house--gratifed himself in everything; and therefore it is that his property and his happiness are all gone. Ver. 22. Every hand of toil. DELITZSCH: "The rich uncompassionate man becomes the defenceless prey of the proletaires." a Ver. 23. Be it the time-taken as a supposition. The simplest rendering here is the surest. i, above, suggests the in this verse, and there must be a similarity of statement and idea. At the very time when his greed is highest, and he is about to satisfy it, then God sends, etc. This makes the 3d clause unmistakable, though it seems to have perplexed commentators. The rain of wrath min gles with the food he is eating, just as in other places tears mingle with the bread one is eating. See Ps. lxxx. 6; xlii. 4. The other rendering makes the filling of his belly in the first clause, God's filling his belly with wrath (by way of irony for food) and then in the third clause, Din is made the object of the verb: He rains his food upon him,-to the neglect of the preposition, or disposing of it in the facile way of calling it Beth essentia. UMBREIT renders it "for his לחום meat," or in place of it. So DILLMANN. That is a sense of in some cases, but the more usual meaning is better here. DELITZSCH renders it: rain upon him into his flesh, giving two indirect objects to, but no direct one, He takes for a sense it seems to have, Zeph. i. 17, and which he derives from the Arabic on; quite a different word with very different vowels. Besides this, it is not easy to give the sense of into after a verb of motion with the idea of attack, especially such a verb as . The rendering flash, Bays DILLMANN, is wholly inadmissible. Ver. 24. Iron lance. p, armor, generally, but here some striking or piercing weapon. Through and through: The rendering is not too strong for that most peculiar and emphatic word abnn. 23 Ver. 25. He hath drawn. The translator agrees with UMBREIT in regarding God as the subject of . The Divine name thus left out makes it all the more fearful as well as emphatic. It might be rendered passively it is drawn --unsheathed--but there is no need of it. Suddenness is the idea the words vividly impress. It is no sooner out of its scabbard than it is through his body; or, between its being drawn from the sheath and being drawn back from his gall is but a moment. The other rendering: he (the one pierced) draws it out, or back, loses all this, besides having very serious philological difficulties. It must, in that case, refer to the arrow just above, but the verb is ever used of the sword in the numerous places of its occurrence, except in Ruth iv. 7, 8, where it means slipping the foot ont of the shoe or sandal, and Ps. cxxix. 6, where it is the slipping of the flower out of its calix, or of the fruit from its glume or husk (entschloffen; see HUPFELD). When used of a weapon it is always the sword, and its drawing is from its sheath. Jud. iii. 22 is only a seeming exception, as there the body is regarded as the sheath, and it is the sword still; no other weapon being carried in a sheath. The word (S. L. P.) is onoma topic, like our word slip-not that the one is derived from the other, but that both are formed on the same principle as signifying an easy slipping motion. The rendering of DELITZSCH and others, makes, moreover, a feeble tautology: "he draws it out; and it comes out." Another reason given by UMBREIT has much force: p fulgur, brightness, is generally used of the sword when applied to a weapon; Deut. xxxii. 41; Ezek. xxi. 15, 20; or sometimes of the spear, he might have said. The barb of the arrow, moreover, would prevent its being easily drawn back by the victim, and tearing, as DELITZSCH renders, would be greatly out of congruity with the verb . On see Note (7) chap. xxxv. 5. T" TT 24 Ver. 25. He is gone. The accents separate from DN. The latter word cannot, therefore, be the subject, even if the number permitted. The verb stands by itself. There is an appalling suddenness and abruptness in this whole description, which is best given in measures somewhat irregular. For examples of way, see xiv. 20; xix. 10; xxvii. 20. taken in a similar The rendering which 26 27 28 29 In his hid treasures lies all darkness hid; Still feeding on the remnant in his tent. Against him rises up the earth. His wealth to other lands" departs, Like flowing waters, in His day of wrath. This is the bad man's portion sent from God,- regards the word as separated, is sustained by ROSENMUELLER, * Ver. 26. Hid treasures 1']. The two words have both of them the idea of hiding, and there seems to be something of a sententious play upon them. 26. Ver. 26. Self-enkindled; not blown upon. Ver. 26. Still feeding. EWALD, ZOCK., ROSENM., UMBREIT, make y from yy: Uebel geht es dem. The other sense is according to the accents and the metaphor of fire feeding (ignis depascens) which is in so many languages. ≈ Ver. 28. To other lands departs: 1-goes into exile. -to avoid a tan אֵל 29 Ver. 29. The Mighty One. This is CONANT's judicious rendering of the divine name tology. 1 Ver. 2. O listen. The doubling of the verb here denotes not so much a desire for attentive hearing, as to be heard at all. It might be expressed by an emphatic auxiliary do: Do listen, etc. * Ver. 5. Turn now. has the sense of turning and looking in the face. On leaving out the mere copulative in such cases, see Note xiii. 23. 3 Ver. 7. Live at all. There is an emphasis on n. The astonishment is at God's suffering them to remain on earth, or even to be born. He goes to the root of the great problem of evil. This was the thought that so dismayed him whenever he called it to mind. 4 Ver. 7. Giant-like. Something of this-kind demanded by the strong word : Heroes. See Gen. vi. 4. 5 Ver. 8. Their seed. Instead of description intended to be universal and dogmatic, it is clear that Job is simply touched by the contrast between his own state, bereaved of children, stripped of property, suffering acutest pain, with the condition of many a bad man in directly opposite circumstances. The points he makes show this, and it may be in perfect harmony with what follows in ver. 17, where his thoughts tend to take the other and the larger view. See ADDENDA, p. 10 11 12 13 14 15 The issue of their herds is sure;6 Their kine bring forth without mischance. No knowledge of Thy ways do we desire. The Almighty! who is he that we should serve him? 17 18 19 20 21 [Yet, truth" ye say]; how oft goes out the lamp of evil men! When God, in wrath, allots them deadly12 pangs. Like stubble are they then before the wind, Like chaff the whirling tempest bears away. When sundered thus the number of his months? [PAUSE.] Ver. 10. The issue of their herds. In this clear passage, euphemistic language may be allowed. * Ver. 10. Sons and daughters. Dis in contrast with rendered little ones. It may be taken for the grown-up children of both sexes. Ver. 13. In joy unbroken. Heb. 10, in good. But this is to be taken here for what the wicked man esteems the good, his summum bonum,-pleasure or enjoyment uninterrupted and without stint. ז' Ver. 13. In a moment. A quick death is spoken of as the good fortune of the wicked. "There are no bands in their death," Ps. lxxiii. 4. an instant of time; 17 quiet; there would seem to be here intended something of both ideas. here is rendered the grave. It has a further sense, the spirit world, or the under-world. It is, however, best rendered here according to the bad man's conception. 19 Ver. 16. But lo. For a discussion in respect to the remarkable transition here, and in the verse following. See EXCURSUS, ADDENDA, pa. 175 Ver. 17. (Yet truth ye say). For the propriety of the words in brackets, and of the interpretation generally, see ADDENDA, pa 175 13 Ver. 19. Eloah treasures. There is no warrant for taking this as a question; still less as an ironical taunt on the part of Job, as though making it the language of the friends and then deriding it. Equally defenceless is it, the making imprecatory here, and thus to differ from all the other futures before and after it. See EXCURS. II. on this chapter; ADDENDA, p. 182. The retribution on his sons is, in fact, retribution on himself, and, in some way, he shall know it to be so. It may be, too, that 11 may have, in this verse, its other clear and frequent sense of strength and wealth. 14 Ver. 21. For what his pleasure. What concern, others render it. A turn may be given to this which may make it seem to favor the other or imprecatory rendering of the previous verse (“for what cares he for his house after him"); but the other changes which this is made to suit are so forced as to invalidate the opposite reasoning, however plausible, in respect to this verse. A connection of thought between vers. 20 and 21 is easily seen without it. A sudden destruction is predicted, ver. 20, when his wealth goes to others, and what pleasure will he have of it? This suddenness is intimated in which means sharp cutting, cut ting off in the very midst of his enjoyments,-not a calm old age, and easy death closing all cares, which is demanded by the other view. The thought of judicial severity is insepa. thus used. 12 Ver. 17. Deadly pangs. Dan, tortures, primary rable from 7 Bense, to bind. |