complete verse (Job 8:2)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Job 8:2:

  • Kupsabiny: “For how long will you be talking too much?
    For how long will you hit with your tongue for nothing?” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “How long will you talk like this?
    Your words are just like a great wind. ” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “‘When will- you (sing.) -stop talking? You (sing.) are very/extremely noisy and what you (sing.) are-saying has-no value.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “‘Job, how much longer will you talk like this?
    What you say is only hot air.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

Translation commentary on Job 8:1 - 8:2

Then Bildad the Shuhite answered: see 2.11 for discussion of the names and origins of Job’s three friends. For comments on verse 1 see also 4.1. Although in Hebrew each speaker is identified at the beginning of his speech, some languages prefer to place such an identification at the end; for example, “I am Bildad from Shuah and this is what I said to Job.” It may be necessary in some languages to provide a transition from one discourse to the next by saying, for example, “After Job finished speaking, then Bildad from Shuah began to speak.” Answered does not mean that Bildad is replying to a question posed by Job, but that he will now take his turn to address Job, to give him his wise counsel. Having identified Bildad as the speaker by means of the heading, Good News Translation and others do not repeat the information in a formal translation of verse 1.

How long will you say these things is the first part of a double rhetorical question. How long is not used to ask a question about the time, but rather to ask why Job does not stop talking, or to rebuke him for talking at such length. These things refers to the content of Job’s speech in chapters 6 and 7, “all these things you have been saying.” New Jerusalem Bible says “How much longer are you going to talk like this?”

And the words of your mouth be a great wind: Bildad’s question refers to the opinions Job has expressed in chapter 7. The expression of your mouth frequently occurs with words, but it adds nothing to the meaning and most often will not be translated. Great wind is a derogatory way of referring to all that Job said. Good News Translation renders it “windy speech,” and Bible en français courant calls it “that whirlwind of words.” In some languages great wind could imply that Bildad is impressed with the powerful and effective nature of Job’s speech. This is not the sense of Bildad’s words.

Translators may find it necessary to reduce the parallelism of verse 2 into one coherent question as in Good News Translation. If the question form must be avoided, it is possible to say, for example, “You talk and talk, and what you say is like the wind” or “You talk and never stop. It is like a wind storm.”

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 .