UTN uW Translation Notes:

Job 38 General Notes

Structure and Formatting

This chapter is the beginning of Yahweh’s response to Job. His response continues through chapter 41.The ULT sets the lines of this chapter farther to the right on the page than the rest of the text because it is poetry.In this chapter, Yahweh begins asking Job a series of questions in order to show that Job does not understand the workings of the created world. Yahweh asks questions about the earth in verses 4–20, with a summary challenge to Job in verse 21. Yahweh then asks questions about the sky in verses 22–38. He starts asking questions about animals and birds in verse 39; this part of his speech continues into the next chapter.The implication is that if Job does not understand and cannot explain how God makes things work in the visible creation, he certainly does not understand and cannot explain what God is doing as he works in unseen, mysterious ways to accomplish his purposes in the lives of people and over the course of human history.When God comes to Job in the storm and responds to his questions, it becomes obvious that Elihu was wrong to say that God would not meet with Job. This shows God’s generosity to Job in granting him an interview as he requested, even though in the interview, God has to humble Job by demonstrating how little he actually knows.

Religious and Cultural Concepts in This Chapter

Yahweh’s description of the creation

In this chapter, Yahweh describes the earth, sea, and sky according to the way the people of Job’s culture understood them. For example, in verse 16 Yahweh speaks of “springs” at the bottom of the sea that provide it with water. In verse 22, he speaks of “storehouses” in the sky where snow and hail are kept. In some parts of the chapter, these references occur within poetic images, such as the image in verses 4–6 of the earth as a building with “foundations” or the image in verses 12–13 of the dawn grasping the “edges” of the earth and shaking it. But in other places, the references do not occur within poetic images. In such places, Yahweh’s questions to Job, which demonstrate the limits of Job’s knowledge, depend for their force on these features being real, even though they do not correspond to the creation as we would describe it today. We may consider that Yahweh is using terminology that Job and the others who are listening would understand in order to communicate moral and spiritual insights to them. If it would be helpful to your readers, you could translate these descriptions of the natural world from an ancient perspective with equivalent expressions that use terms that reflect your own culture’s perspective. Notes suggest how you might do this in various places. For example, a note to verse 16 suggests speaking of the “bottom of the sea” rather than of the “springs of the sea.”

Translation Issues in This Chapter

The nature of the questions in verses 4–41

Yawheh asks Job a series of questions in verses 4–41. He may want Job to try to answer these questions so that Job will have to admit that he does not know the answers. So these could be actual questions that Yahweh is using to get information, specifically, the information from Job that he does not know the answers. Alternatively, Yahweh may be using the question form for emphasis. A note to verse 4 suggests two possible ways in which you could translate the question there. Consider the most appropriate way to translate each of the questions in this chapter.