complete verse (Job 13:6)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Job 13:6:

  • Kupsabiny: “Listen please to the words that I am going to say to you.
    Remove the wax from your ears and listen well.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “Listen to my argument,
    and listen well to the complaint of my mouth.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “‘Now you (plur.) listen to my reasons.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “Everything that you say shows that you should be punished;
    so, it is not necessary for me to show that.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

Translation commentary on Job 13:6

Hear now my reasoning: in two parallel lines Job opens this part of his speech, just as he will do again in verses 13 and 17. The two lines of verse 6 form a chiastic structure in Hebrew which has the form:
Hear now my arguments
And to the pleadings of my lips listen.

In Hebrew my reasoning is a noun derived from the verb translated “argue my case” in verse 3. It can also be translated “argument, defense,” or “Listen while I present my case.”

And listen to the pleadings of my lips: the root of the word translated pleadings means “contend, dispute, quarrel” and is used in 9.3; 10.2. Pleadings of my lips is figurative and heightens the poetic image of the more direct “arguments” or reasoning of the first line. Good News Translation “Listen while I state my case” translates a summary of the meaning of the two lines but makes no attempt to handle the poetic intensification. Also Good News Translation reduces the two lines to one. Verse 6 may be rendered, for example, “Listen to what I have to explain to you; just be quiet so you can hear my protests” or “Be quiet while I present my case, and listen to my arguments.”

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 .