But it is the spirit in a man: Elihu is saying in this verse that years alone, or having lived many years, does not give a person wisdom; it is rather the spirit which gives it. Elihu will conclude in verse 10 that he has such wisdom.

The problem in this verse is the unclear relation between spirit in line a and breath of the Almighty in line b. There is, of course, some connection with the story of man’s creation, Genesis 2.7, but that does not clarify this verse completely. One way to resolve the problem here is to make spirit refer to “the spirit of God,” as in New English Bible, “But the spirit of God himself is in man and the breath of the Almighty gives him understanding,” so that the two lines are then fully parallel. Good News Translation accepts the parallelism but for clarity brings the two terms together: “It is the spirit of the Almighty God.” However, some feel that parallelism should not be imposed here, and take spirit in a man to refer to his “intelligence” which he receives from God’s spirit. In that case we may translate, for example, “It is true that everyone has intelligence, because the Almighty God has breathed it into him,” or as Bible en français courant says, “It is true that what makes a person intelligent is the Spirit, the inspiration of God Almighty.” If spirit is taken as in Bible en français courant, some translations will prefer to write “Spirit” with a capital “S.” Good News Translation has translated man as “men.” Elihu is speaking generally here, and man is to be understood as “a person,” or even more generally, as “people.”

Although the interpretation in Bible en français courant seems preferable, it is not possible to rule out the implied parallelism of New English Bible. Translators are free to choose. However, it may be advisable to place the alternative rendering in a footnote.

Quoted with permission from Reyburn, Wiliam. A Handbook on Job. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1992. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .