Job’s use of ‘erets

Job’s use of ‘erets

·         Job 1:1 There was a man in the land of Uz named Job. He was a man of complete integrity, who feared God and turned away from evil.

 In Job, we initially encounter ‘erets (אֶרֶץ) in the first verse, where Job is said to be be’erets ‘uts. The Septuagint renders that phrase ἐν χώρᾳ τῇ Αυσίτιδι (in the country Ausitis) and we English render it “in the land of Uz.” This first instance of the word is clearly a geographical reference to one’s country of residence.

 A similar use of the term is found here:

 ·         Job 22:8 while the land belonged to a powerful man and an influential man lived on it.

 Often the word seems to imply something more general.

 ·         Job 1:7 Yahveh asked Satan, "Where have you come from?" "From roaming through the land," Satan answered him, "and walking around on it."

 Satan is not talking about a particular country, but all the land of the planet, compared to all its seas or skies (See Job 12:7-8). To render the term as earth here is perhaps making Satan reveal a cosmology unknown to the people of the ancient near east.

 ·         Job 1:8 Then Yahveh said to Satan, "Have you considered my servant Job? No one else on the land is like him, a man of perfect integrity, who fears God and turns away from evil."

 Likewise, when Yahveh reflects the same use of ‘erets in his reply, he is not necessarily referring to the celestial body of earth.

 ·         Job 1:10 Haven't you placed a hedge around him, his household, and everything he owns? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land.

 The hedge that God had placed around Job is territorial, not planetary. HALOT defines this meaning as “the whole of the land.”[1]

 Other instances of this use in Job are:

 ·         Job 2:3 Then Yahveh said to Satan, "Have you considered my servant Job? No one else on the land is like him, a man of perfect integrity, who fears God and turns away from evil. He still retains his integrity, even though you incited me against him, to destroy him for no good reason."

·         Job 3:14 with the kings and counselors of the land, who rebuilt ruined cities for themselves,

·         Job 5:10 He gives rain to the land and sends water to the fields.

·         Job 5:22 You will laugh at destruction and hunger and not fear the land's wild creatures.

·         Job 7:1 Isn't each mortal consigned to forced labor in the land? Are not his days like those of a hired worker?

·         Job 9:6 He shakes the land from its place so that its pillars tremble

·         Job 9:24 The land is handed over to the wicked; he blindfolds its judges. If it isn't he, then who is it?

·         Job 12:8 Or speak to the land, and it will instruct you; let the fish of the sea inform you.

·         Job 12:24 He deprives the land's leaders of reason and makes them wander in a trackless wasteland.

·         Job 15:19 to whom alone the land was given when no foreigner passed among them.

·         Job 20:4 Don't you know that ever since antiquity, from the time a human was placed on the land,

·         Job 24:4 They push the needy off the road; the poor of the land are forced into hiding.

·         Job 26:7 He sends the northern skies over empty space; he hangs the land on nothing.

·         Job 28:13 No mortal can know its value, since it cannot be found in the land of the living.

·         Job 28:24 For he looks to the ends of the land and sees everything under the sky.

·         Job 30:8 Foolish men, without even a name. They were forced to leave the land.

·         Job 34:13 Who gave him authority over the land? Who put him in charge of the continents?

·         Job 35:11 who gives us more understanding than the animals of the land and makes us wiser than the birds of the sky?"

·         Job 37:13 He causes this to happen for punishment, for his land, or for his faithful love.

·         Job 38:4 Where were you when I established the land? Tell me, if you have understanding.

·         Job 38:13 so it may seize the edges of the land and shake the wicked out of it?

·         Job 38:18 Have you comprehended the extent of the land? Tell me, if you know all this.

·         Job 42:15 No women as beautiful as Job's daughters could be found in all the land, and their father granted them an inheritance with their brothers.

 The primary meaning of ‘erets shows up here:

 ·         Job 1:20 Then Job stood up, tore his robe, and shaved his head. He fell to the ground and worshiped,

 Job was not flying in space. He was a man walking on the ground and responded to his tragedy by falling to the ground. This is the predominant meaning of ‘erets in Job. It is also the predominant meaning of ‘erets according to HALOT.[2]

 ·         Job 2:13 Then they sat on the ground with him seven days and nights, but no one spoke a word to him because they saw that his suffering was very intense.

·         Job 5:25 You will also know that your offspring will be many and your descendants like the grass of the ground.

·         Job 8:9 since we were born only yesterday and know nothing. Our days above the ground are a shadow.

 The use of the preposition ‘al (עַל) is significant here. It denotes a position above something else like above the sky (Psalm 8:1) or above a person’s tent (Job 29:4). In 8:9, Bildad is describing a person’s life as the period of time he spends above the ground. The meaning of ‘al as above can also be seen in related words like the adverb ma’al (from above) and the noun mo’al (the lifting up [of hands).[3] In modern Hebrew, ‘al means “above and in contact with” and ma’al is used in the phrase ma’al pney hayam – above sea level [4]

 The KJV translation “days upon earth” is misleading. It can be read by a dualist to refer to the soul’s life on earth as opposed to its life elsewhere after the death of the body. That was not Bildad’s point. His point was that human life in general is too short for us to understand everything that happens. Before we gain enough wisdom above the ground, we die and are planted below the ground.

 ·         Job 10:21 before I go to the dark and shadowy ground, never to return.

·         Job 10:22 It is a dark ground, like a deep shadow, darkness and disorder, where even the light is like the darkness."

·         Job 11:9 Their measure is longer than the ground and wider than the sea.

·         Job 12:15 When he withholds water, everything dries up, and when he releases it, it overturns the ground.

·         Job 14:8 If its roots grow old in the ground and its stump starts to die in the soil,

·         Job 14:19 as water wears away stones and torrents wash away the topsoil from the ground, so you destroy a mortal’s hope.

·         Job 15:29 He will no longer be rich; his wealth will not endure. His crops will not extend in the ground.

·         Job 16:13 his archers surround me. He pierces my kidneys without mercy and pours my bile on the ground.

·         Job 16:18 Ground, do not cover my blood; may my cry for help find no resting place.

·         Job 18:4 You who tear your throat in anger -- should the ground be abandoned on your account, or a rock be removed from its place?

·         Job 18:10 A rope lies hidden for him on the ground, and a snare waits for him along the path.

·         Job 18:17 All memory of him perishes from the ground; he has no name anywhere.

·         Job 20:27 The sky will expose his iniquity, and the ground will rise up against him.

·         Job 24:18 They float on the surface of the water. Their section of the ground is cursed, so that they never go to their vineyards.

·         Job 28:5 Food may come from the ground, but below the surface it is transformed as by fire.

·         Job 37:3 He lets it loose beneath the entire sky; his lightning to the ends of the ground.

·         Job 37:6 For he says to the snow, "Fall to the ground," and the torrential rains, his mighty torrential rains,

·         Job 37:12 They swirl about, turning round and round at his direction, accomplishing everything he commands them over the surface of the ground.

·         Job 37:17 You whose clothes get hot when the south wind brings calm to the ground,

·         Job 38:24 What road leads to the place where light is dispersed? Where is the source of the east wind that spreads across the ground?

·         Job 38:26 to bring rain on an uninhabited ground, on a desert with no human life,

·         Job 38:33 Do you know the laws of the sky? Can you impose its authority on the ground?

·         Job 39:14 She abandons her eggs on the ground and lets them be warmed in the sand.

·         Job 39:24 He chews up the ground with trembling rage; he cannot stand still at the trumpet's sound.

 Not all misunderstanding of Scripture is caused by deliberate false teaching. Sometimes misunderstanding continues because of the way our traditional Bible versions translate simple phrases like aley-‘erets in Job 8:9. Some traditional readings mask the clear meaning of texts. One of the goals of my translation project is to correct this problem wherever possible.

[1] Köhler Ludwig et al. The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament. Study ed. Brill 2001. (אֶרֶץ --4).

[2] Köhler, (אֶרֶץ --1).

[3] Feyerabend, Karl. A Complete Hebrew-English Pocket-Dictionary to the Old Testament. Berlin-Schöneberg: Lagenscheidt, 1910. pp. 187-188.

[4] Doniach N. S et al. The Oxford English-Hebrew Dictionary. Oxford 1996. p. 627, 278.