After being identified as the speaker, as at 34.1 and 36.1, Elihu questions Job about the claims he has made. And Elihu said is the author’s way of telling the reader that Elihu’s speech is continuing. And is seldom satisfactory as a marker to show the action is continuing. Better is “Then,” or perhaps no linking word at all.

In 34.9 Elihu paraphrased Job’s words: “It profits a man nothing that he should take delight in God.” Job’s assertion has been that being innocent of wrong has no effect on God. Elihu now examines this idea and sets forth two of Job’s claims against each other. On the one side is Job’s claim to have a just case to defend against God. On the other is Job’s claim that it makes no difference to God whether a man sins or does not sin; God will always act entirely independently of what man does.

Do you think this to be just?: think translates the verb used in 13.24; 19.15; 33.10, and translated “to count” or “to consider.” It may be rendered, for example, “Is it your opinion?” or “Does it appear to you?” This points forward to the questions in verse 3. Just translates the same word used in 32.9 and 34.4 meaning “right, justice.” Elihu is asking if Job considers it right to claim what he says in the next line.

Do you say, ‘It is my right before God’ …?: my right translates the Hebrew tsedeq, the word used commonly throughout Job to refer to his claim to be “right, innocent, not guilty of wrongdoing.” Before God is translated in various ways. Some understand it to mean “more than God,” but Job has argued repeatedly that he is innocent in God’s sight, and so the meaning is “I am right in my case against God,” or as Habel translates verse 2, “Do you consider it just to claim ‘I am right against El’?” In some languages this quoted question will have to be expressed, for example, as “Do you think it is fair for you to say to God, ‘I am innocent, God’?” or indirectly, “… to say that you are innocent in God’s eyes?”

That you ask, ‘What advantage have I?: you refers to Job. The Hebrew text shows that Job’s quoted question is “What advantage (benefit) is there for you?” In 7.20 Job asked God “If I sin, what do I do to thee, thou watcher of men?” Revised Standard Version and others change the Hebrew “you” to I in line a. However, Job has not asked how he benefits from sinning. Therefore we should retain the Hebrew “you” as referring to God. Good News Translation has made clear that “you” refers to God, by saying “or to ask God, ‘How does … you?’ ” Some translators may find it better to express the quoted questions in verses 2 and 3 as negative statements; for example, “or to say to God, ‘My sin makes no difference to you.’ ”

How am I better off than if I had sinned? is literally “what do I gain from my sin?” This line is at best ambiguous, since the final Hebrew word may be understood to mean “rather than my sin,” which would mean “more than if I had sinned.” The line may also be taken to mean “what do I profit without sin?” Dhorme and others follow the Septuagint, “What do I do if I sin?” Job has not admitted his sin as the cause of his suffering. However, since Job claims that a person’s sins have no effect on God, “What have I gained by not sinning?” is a more likely meaning of this line. This line may be expressed as a positive question; for example, “What have I gained by being innocent?” or “What good has it done for me to be innocent?”

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 .