Job 31

I made an agreement with my eyes. So how could I look at a young woman with desire?

1I made a covenant with mine eyes; why then should I think upon a maid?

NoteA covenant was a formal, binding pact, the kind of thing made between kings or between parties to a contract, a far stronger word than a private resolution. Job says he made one with his own eyes, as if they were a party he had to hold to terms.

2For what does God hand out to a person from above? What share does the Almighty send down from on high?

2For what portion of God is there from above? and what inheritance of the Almighty from on high?

Note"Portion" and "inheritance" are words from the dividing of land: the share allotted to a person, marked out and handed over. Job is asking what share God deals out to a man who lives the way he has just described.

3Isn't ruin what comes to the wicked, and disaster to those who do wrong?

3Is not destruction to the wicked? and a strange punishment to the workers of iniquity?

4Doesn't God see how I live and count every step I take?

4Doth not he see my ways, and count all my steps?

5If I have lived a lie, or if my feet have run to cheat someone,

5If I have walked with vanity, or if my foot hath hasted to deceit;

NoteFrom here to the end of the chapter Job speaks in the form of a sworn oath of innocence: "If I have done such a thing, then let such a punishment fall on me." These are not confessions. Each "if" is a charge he is daring anyone to prove, and the curse attached to it is what he accepts if it is true. Some of the sentences break off before the curse arrives, which is normal in this kind of oath, leaving the punishment unspoken made it more, not less, binding.

6then let God weigh me on honest scales, so he can see that I am honest.

6Let me be weighed in an even balance that God may know mine integrity.

NoteThe picture is a merchant's balance: a beam with a pan hanging at each end, the goods in one and standard weights in the other. Rigged weights were the classic form of fraud, so "honest scales" was a stock phrase for a fair test.

7If my steps have turned off the right path, if my heart has chased after what my eyes wanted, or if any stain has stuck to my hands,

7If my step hath turned out of the way, and mine heart walked after mine eyes, and if any blot hath cleaved to mine hands;

8then let someone else eat what I plant, and let my children be torn up by the roots.

8Then let me sow, and let another eat; yea, let my offspring be rooted out.

NoteThe Hebrew word behind "my crops" can mean either what a man grows or the children he fathers; the older English "my offspring" takes it the second way. Both senses fit an oath about losing what you have produced.

9If my heart has been drawn to another man's wife, or if I have waited in hiding by my neighbor's door,

9If mine heart have been deceived by a woman, or if I have laid wait at my neighbour’s door;

10then let my own wife grind grain for another man, and let other men sleep with her.

10Then let my wife grind unto another, and let others bow down upon her.

NoteGrinding grain by hand at a stone mill was the day-long drudgery of the lowest women in a household, usually slaves. The line also carries a sexual sense, which the second half of the verse makes explicit. The curse matches the crime: a man who takes another man's wife loses his own.

11For that would be a shameful crime. It is the kind of wrong the judges must punish.

11For this is an heinous crime; yea, it is an iniquity to be punished by the judges.

NoteAdultery was not treated as a private grievance to be settled between households. It was a criminal matter that came before the town's judges, and in the law codes of the region it could carry the death penalty.

12It is a fire that burns all the way down to the place of ruin. It would burn up everything I had gained.

12For it is a fire that consumeth to destruction, and would root out all mine increase.

NoteThe Hebrew names the destination of this fire: Abaddon, "Destruction," a name for the realm of the dead deep below the earth. The image is of a fire that burns all the way down and leaves nothing.

13If I have brushed aside the complaint of my male or female servant when they had a case against me,

13If I did despise the cause of my manservant or of my maidservant, when they contended with me;

NoteThese are household slaves or bonded servants. In most of the ancient world a slave had no standing to bring a case against his own master; Job's claim is that when his servants had a grievance against him, he heard it out and did not simply dismiss it.

14then what will I do when God stands up to act? When he calls me to account, what will I answer him?

14What then shall I do when God riseth up? and when he visiteth, what shall I answer him?

15Didn't the same God who made me in my mother's body also make them? Didn't one and the same God shape us both before we were born?

15Did not he that made me in the womb make him? and did not one fashion us in the womb?

16If I have held back from the poor what they needed, or let the eyes of a widow grow tired from waiting,

16If I have withheld the poor from their desire, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail;

NoteWidows and fatherless children appear together all through these chapters because they were the two classes of person with no adult male to speak for them, no one to defend their land, press their case in court, or feed them. Eyes that "fail" is an idiom for watching and waiting for help until the hope goes out of you.

17or eaten my bit of food all by myself while the fatherless child got none of it

17Or have eaten my morsel myself alone, and the fatherless hath not eaten thereof;

18for from the time I was young I raised that child the way a father would, and from my birth I looked after the widow

18(For from my youth he was brought up with me, as with a father, and I have guided her from my mother’s womb;)

NoteThis verse is one of the hardest in the book to construe; the Hebrew literally says "from my mother's womb I guided her," which cannot be meant flatly, since Job would then be caring for widows as an infant. It is usually taken as a way of saying "for as long as I can remember."

19if I have seen anyone dying for lack of clothes, or a poor man with nothing to cover him,

19If I have seen any perish for want of clothing, or any poor without covering;

20and he did not thank me from his heart for warming him with the wool from my own sheep,

20If his loins have not blessed me, and if he were not warmed with the fleece of my sheep;

NoteThe Hebrew says his loins blessed me, the lower body, the part a woolen cloak wraps and warms. To "bless" someone here means to thank them and speak well of them publicly, not to pronounce a religious blessing.

21if I have raised my hand against a fatherless child because I knew the court would take my side,

21If I have lifted up my hand against the fatherless, when I saw my help in the gate:

NoteThe open space just inside a town's gate was where the elders sat and lawsuits were heard. To "see your help in the gate" was to know you had the men who decided cases on your side, so that you could push a defenseless person around and win any dispute that followed.

22then let my arm drop off at the shoulder, and let it be broken off at the joint.

22Then let mine arm fall from my shoulder blade, and mine arm be broken from the bone.

23For ruin sent by God was a terror to me, and I could not stand up against his greatness.

23For destruction from God was a terror to me, and by reason of his highness I could not endure.

24If I have put my hope in gold, or said to pure gold, “You are what I trust,”

24If I have made gold my hope, or have said to the fine gold, Thou art my confidence;

25if I have been glad that my wealth was great and that my own hand had piled up so much,

25If I rejoiced because my wealth was great, and because mine hand had gotten much;

26if I have looked at the sun when it shone bright, or the moon moving in its splendor,

26If I beheld the sun when it shined, or the moon walking in brightness;

NoteThe sun and the moon were worshiped as gods across the ancient Near East, and Job's world is full of that practice. He is denying that he ever joined it, even privately, even by a gesture nobody saw.

27and my heart was quietly drawn to them, so that my hand blew them a kiss,

27And my heart hath been secretly enticed, or my mouth hath kissed my hand:

NoteBringing the hand to the mouth and blowing a kiss toward a god or its image was a standard act of homage, the physical gesture of worship. Doing it toward the sun or moon was worship of them.

28then that too would be a wrong the judge must punish, because I would have denied God who is above.

28This also were an iniquity to be punished by the judge: for I should have denied the God that is above.

29If I was glad when the man who hated me was ruined, or cheered when trouble found him

29If I rejoiced at the destruction of him that hated me, or lifted up myself when evil found him:

NoteGloating over a fallen enemy was ordinary and expected behavior, not something a man would normally think to deny. Job lists it among the wrongs he could be charged with.

30no, I have not let my mouth sin by calling down a curse to take his life

30Neither have I suffered my mouth to sin by wishing a curse to his soul.

NoteA curse was not merely an insult. Words spoken against a person's life were believed to work, to be released and to do real damage, so calling down a curse counted as an act, not just speech.

31if the men of my household have not said, “Who is there that he has not fed until they were full?”

31If the men of my tabernacle said not, Oh that we had of his flesh! we cannot be satisfied.

NoteThe Hebrew of this line is disputed. Read one way, Job's household staff are saying they could never get enough of his meat; read another, they are saying that no one who came to the door ever went away unfed. Either way the point is the open table Job kept, described in the next verse.

32No stranger ever had to sleep out in the street, for I opened my doors to the traveler.

32The stranger did not lodge in the street: but I opened my doors to the traveller.

NoteThere were no inns for ordinary travelers, so a stranger arriving at nightfall depended entirely on someone taking him in. Sheltering and feeding him was a recognized obligation across this world, and failing it was a public disgrace.

33If I have covered up my wrongs the way Adam did, hiding my guilt inside myself

33If I covered my transgressions as Adam, by hiding mine iniquity in my bosom:

Note"As Adam" translates a Hebrew phrase that can equally mean "like Adam," hiding in the garden, or "the way people do", since the same word is both the name Adam and the ordinary word for a human being. Ancient and modern readers have gone both ways.

34because I was afraid of the crowd, or because the scorn of the families frightened me, so that I kept quiet and would not go out my door

34Did I fear a great multitude, or did the contempt of families terrify me, that I kept silence, and went not out of the door?

Note"Families" here means clans, the extended kin groups that made up a town and whose collective opinion carried real weight. Staying behind your own door meant withdrawing from the gate, where public business and lawsuits were conducted.

35Oh, that someone would listen to me! Here is my signature. Let the Almighty answer me, and let the one accusing me write out his charge.

35Oh that one would hear me! behold, my desire is, that the Almighty would answer me, and that mine adversary had written a book.

NoteThe Hebrew word here is taw, the last letter of the alphabet, used as a signature mark. The King James reads it instead as "my desire".

36I would surely carry that document on my shoulder. I would wear it like a crown.

36Surely I would take it upon my shoulder, and bind it as a crown to me.

NoteDocuments were carried rolled or on a tablet. Hoisting the charge onto his shoulder and wearing it like a crown is the opposite of hiding it: he would parade the accusation in public, confident that reading it out would clear him.

37I would give him an account of every step I have taken. I would walk up to him like a prince.

37I would declare unto him the number of my steps; as a prince would I go near unto him.

NoteA prince approaches a king upright, as someone with standing, rather than face-down in the dust like a petitioner or a condemned man. Job says he would come to God that way.

38If my land cries out against me, and its plowed rows weep together,

38If my land cry against me, or that the furrows likewise thereof complain;

39if I have eaten what it produced without paying for it, or taken the life out of those who owned it,

39If I have eaten the fruits thereof without money, or have caused the owners thereof to lose their life:

Note"Those who owned it" are the people with a prior claim on the land, earlier owners or the tenants and hired hands who worked it. To eat its produce without paying meant taking the harvest while cheating the men whose labor or land it was.

40then let thorny weeds grow instead of wheat, and stinking weeds instead of barley. The words of Job are ended.

40Let thistles grow instead of wheat, and cockle instead of barley. The words of Job are ended.

NoteWheat and barley were the two staple grain crops; the weeds named are thorny scrub and a foul-smelling plant, worthless growth of exactly the kind that takes over abandoned fields. The closing sentence is not Job speaking but a note by whoever assembled the book, marking the end of his speeches.