22. Wherefore do ye persecute me like God? And will never be satiated on my flesh ?* should they further persecute him with their hard speeches? * The sense of the first hemistich is, Is it not enough that God persecutes me? would you also add to the affliction by which I am visited ? LXX. διατί με διώκετε ὥσπερ καὶ ὁ κύριος; The Syr. TODİYİ OA) O1 ; "Why will you also persecute me like God?" No conjecture can be more unfortunate than that of Reiske, to read ip, and to translate "Wherefore do ye persecute me like a stag?" In the second hemistich is expressed the most dire attack of his enemies against Job. The eastern nations use the figure of eating one's flesh, to express in the strongest manner calumny. Vide Psalm xxvii. 2. So in Chald. Vide Daniel iii. 8. Hence, in the Syr. New Test., the devil is called („‚olbs. Also the same figure is to be found in Arabic. Vide Schultens in loco. Thus there is an Arabic proverb 66 "Ipse si edam carnem meam, at non sinam eam edi ab alio, i. e. "si ipse me vexare volim, at ab alio me vexari non "sinam." Vide Meidan Proverb. Arab. Ed. Hen. 23. O that my words were written down! That they were engraved in a book!" 24. Would that they were written with pen of iron and with lead," And inscribed upon the rocks for eternity! a Alb. Schultens, p. 7. Vide other parallels in Gesenius Thesaur. Phil. Crit. Ling. Heb. et Chald. 91. Thus must Job die misunderstood by his friends; they will not allow themselves to be persuaded by his protestations of innocence! Could his words only be preserved to posterity in imperishable writing, that, at least, would ensure a more just judgment to the Unfortunate! Mark the absolute construction in the striking prefixing of to . Vide Gesenius in Lehrgeb. 725; Ewald in Crit. Gram. 636. 2 So that melted lead should be fused into the characters engraved with an iron pen in the rock, in order to make the writing more conspicuous. Thus Jarchi rightly explains it. For other explanations, vide Rosenmüller in loco. a As long as the rock lasts, this writing shall endure, that is, long, or for ever; for the idea of everlasting in the Old Testament is not always expressed with metaphysical accuracy, a remark of importance in explaining various passages of holy writ. Vide Isaiah, ix. 5, and the Comment. of b 25. Yet I know that my avenger lives, And at length he will arise on the scene of contention :d Gesenius. The LXX. took Ty for Ty, when they translated εἰς μαρτύριον; by which acceptation they at least shew that they understood Job's reason for wishing to have his words engraved. b Yet I, with emphasis, viz. if not you also! His consciousness of innocence is so strong that he is always convinced that God will at length appear as his avenger, even although this blessed appearing, after which he languishes, should not be vouchsafed to him until his body was altogether wasted to a skeleton. C Literally, I know my avenger is living. * Numb. xxxv. 27, with the addition, is the avenger of blood, who, as next of kin to a murdered person, was in duty bound to avenge him. Vide J. D. Michaelis, Mos. Recht, Part ii. 401. God is figuratively thus termed in reference to the innocently and unjustly destroyed Job. The sense is the same as in ch. xvi. 19. d in literally, as one that comes after, when I can no longer defend myself. y is either poetically used for N, or is conceived in opposition to D, where the expected* avenger dwells; or, as is more probable, it is descriptive of the scene of contention, like the Latin pulvis. This is sanctioned by the meaning of PN, to fight or struggle (Gen. xxxii. 25, 26), a denom. from pa dust. Thus in Greek, παλαίειν comes from πάλη. Jarchi finds, in the expressions of this last hemistich, a mere picture of the eternity of God, which seems unsuitable in this place. He takes قام على = stand by as Isaiah xl. 8. Thus De Wette (" and the last remaineth he upon the earth"), and also Rosenmüller in the 1st edition of his Comment. though in the 2d, he conceives by Dp to be taken for support, as does also De Sacy, (vide Kosegarten Comment. Exeget. Crit. in loc. Jobi, xix. 25, 27), and py to stand for the dust of the dead: 66 eumque novissimum pulveri adstiturum." But the passages advanced in support of this sense ofy, ch. vii. 21, xvii. 16, xx. 11, xxi. 26, cannot be considered as bearing upon the question, since they imply the dust of the earth on which a man rests, and not the dust into which his body is is קוּם עַל־עָפָר changed. And the form of words the most simply explained by the above translation. The translation of Jerome seems erroneous, * Or rather, hoped-for Redeemer. — TRANS, 26. Yea, when my skin is no more, when this is broken to pieces, And I am wholly without flesh, yet shall which in this verse discovers the appearing of the Messiah at the resurrection of the last day, "Scio enim, quod Redemptor meus vivit, et in novissimo die de terra surrecturus sum;" in which case, the The וּבַאֲחֲרוֹן מֵעָפָר אָקוּם text should so stand mode of interpretation, which in this verse and the following discovers the resurrection of the body at the day of judgment, is opposed to the original form, as well as to the connection of the passage and the spirit of the book. Vide Eichhorn's Job's Hopes, in the General Library of Biblical Literature, i. 386; Justi's Fragments from Job, in Paulus' Memorabilia; Augustis' Theol. Papers, Nos. 16, 50, 51; and New Theol. Papers, B. i. 2, 40. It is remarkable that J. D. Michaelis should have translated thus: "I know that my Redeemer liveth; another I (?) will hereafter arise from the dust." Vide his German Translation of the Bible, and his Oriental and Exegetical Library, Part viii. 184. (Vide, on the other hand, Eichhorn in the above-mentioned Treatise, page 387.) Vide Autenreith on the Book of Job, 43, and my Treatise in the Heidleberg Jahrbuch of Literature, 1824, 533. e We pause at this text, so often contested, from |