translation_id: net-engnet

book_id: JOB

label: NET study note

text: Job is mocked by young fellows who come from low extraction. They mocked their elders and their betters. The scorn is strong here – dogs were despised as scavengers.


text: People throw off all restraint in my presence means that when people saw how God afflicted Job, robbing him of his influence and power, then they turned on him with unrestrained insolence (H. H. Rowley, Job [NCBC], 193).


text: See Job 19:12 .


text: The implication from the sentence is that this is a cry to God for help. The sudden change from third person (v. 19 ) to second person (v. 20 ) is indicative of the intense emotion of the sufferer.


text: The verb is simple, but the interpretation difficult. In this verse it probably means he stands up in prayer ( Jer 15:1 ), but it could mean that he makes his case to God. Others suggest a more figurative sense, like the English expression “stand pat,” meaning “remain silent” (see Job 29:8 ).


text: Here Job changes the metaphor again, to the driving storm. God has sent his storms, and Job is blown away.


text: The point of this figure is that Job’s cries of lament are like the howls and screeches of these animals, not that he lives with them. In Job 39:13 the female ostrich is called “the wailer.”