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Job: A New Translation
This revelatory new translation of Job by one of the world’s leading biblical scholars will reshape the way we read this canonical text
The book of Job has often been called the greatest poem ever written. The book, in Edward Greenstein’s characterization, is “a Wunderkind, a genius emerging out of the confluence of two literary streams” which “dazzles like Shakespeare with unrivaled vocabulary and a penchant for linguistic innovation.” Despite the text’s literary prestige and cultural prominence, no English translation has come close to conveying the proper sense of the original. The book has consequently been misunderstood in innumerable details and in its main themes.
Edward Greenstein’s new translation of Job is the culmination of decades of intensive research and painstaking philological and literary analysis, offering a major reinterpretation of this canonical text. Through his beautifully rendered translation and insightful introduction and commentary, Greenstein presents a new perspective: Job, he shows, was defiant of God until the end. The book is more about speaking truth to power than the problem of unjust suffering.
The book of Job has often been called the greatest poem ever written. The book, in Edward Greenstein’s characterization, is “a Wunderkind, a genius emerging out of the confluence of two literary streams” which “dazzles like Shakespeare with unrivaled vocabulary and a penchant for linguistic innovation.” Despite the text’s literary prestige and cultural prominence, no English translation has come close to conveying the proper sense of the original. The book has consequently been misunderstood in innumerable details and in its main themes.
Edward Greenstein’s new translation of Job is the culmination of decades of intensive research and painstaking philological and literary analysis, offering a major reinterpretation of this canonical text. Through his beautifully rendered translation and insightful introduction and commentary, Greenstein presents a new perspective: Job, he shows, was defiant of God until the end. The book is more about speaking truth to power than the problem of unjust suffering.
248 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 701
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261 people want to read
About the author
Edward L. Greenstein
15 books9 followersEdward L. Greenstein is professor emeritus of Bible at Bar-Ilan University and a prolific, world-renowned scholar in many areas of biblical and ancient Near Eastern studies.
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September 25, 2019
The book of Job is notoriously difficult to translate out of Hebrew, and notoriously easy to translate into standard clichés, starting with "the patience of Job" or "the providence of God." Nothing quite prepares you for the metaphysical horror of the tale. God and "the Satan" (not the same as the famous evil angel) are bantering in heaven. God is basking in how much he's adored by his servant Job; the Satan says, No surprise! You've given Job everything – wealth, land, progeny. So they decide to play a little game. How much can we torture Job (right up to his actual death, God decides) before he curses God? And so it goes: death to all his children, property looted and burned, body covered with pustulence. Job doesn't curse God but he's not happy: "Let the day disappear; the day I was born." (Job's wife is more caustic: Curse God and die.) Behind his agony is a raging question: Why?
Next his friends show up to comfort him, allegedly. In fact they torment him with theology, perfectly orthodox theology, straight out of the Old Testament. And the only possible explanation – they offer in their comforting - is that Job must blame himself, for some inscrutable but indubitable reason he has broken faith with God and is justly punished. After all, God has a good reason for everything. Job isn't having it. Wrong wrong wrong he says to all their many speeches. (Greenstein captures the vivid imagery, the echoes, sarcasm and superciliousness of these dialogs.)
Thirty-eight embittered chapters later, God reappears as a cosmic blowhard. He tells Job to shut up, He is the Deity and Job is just a worm. But He also tells the well-meaning friends that they were all wrong. Job alone spoke truly. He rewards Job with 10 more children (pity the wife), fertile lands, double your money, etc. But He never bothers to explain that Job was the unlucky victim of an empyrean gamble. That truth is as appalling as anything in the entire Old Testament.
Edward Greenstein's new translation brings this tale to life with clarity and insight. It's the rare book where the reader will want to read every footnote, because the Satan is in the details. Let me provide one spoiler or incentive to read this masterful translation. In Job's final response to the deity, what he says isn't quite what it sounds like. Here's Greenstein's prologue:
Job understands the deity to be exactly as he had feared: a purveyor of power who cares little for people. Parodying the divine discourse through mimicry, Job expresses disdain toward the deity and pity toward humankind (and not acquiescence, as has generally been thought).
This is a marvelous story from Mesopotamia, half-Gilgamesh, half-Arabian Night, and darker than either.
Next his friends show up to comfort him, allegedly. In fact they torment him with theology, perfectly orthodox theology, straight out of the Old Testament. And the only possible explanation – they offer in their comforting - is that Job must blame himself, for some inscrutable but indubitable reason he has broken faith with God and is justly punished. After all, God has a good reason for everything. Job isn't having it. Wrong wrong wrong he says to all their many speeches. (Greenstein captures the vivid imagery, the echoes, sarcasm and superciliousness of these dialogs.)
Thirty-eight embittered chapters later, God reappears as a cosmic blowhard. He tells Job to shut up, He is the Deity and Job is just a worm. But He also tells the well-meaning friends that they were all wrong. Job alone spoke truly. He rewards Job with 10 more children (pity the wife), fertile lands, double your money, etc. But He never bothers to explain that Job was the unlucky victim of an empyrean gamble. That truth is as appalling as anything in the entire Old Testament.
Edward Greenstein's new translation brings this tale to life with clarity and insight. It's the rare book where the reader will want to read every footnote, because the Satan is in the details. Let me provide one spoiler or incentive to read this masterful translation. In Job's final response to the deity, what he says isn't quite what it sounds like. Here's Greenstein's prologue:
Job understands the deity to be exactly as he had feared: a purveyor of power who cares little for people. Parodying the divine discourse through mimicry, Job expresses disdain toward the deity and pity toward humankind (and not acquiescence, as has generally been thought).
This is a marvelous story from Mesopotamia, half-Gilgamesh, half-Arabian Night, and darker than either.
April 23, 2020
I put this on my to-read list after reading the Atlantic article, "And Then Job Said unto the Lord, You Can't Be Serious" (https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/...)
The gist is that this new translation upends the commonly understood message of Job by casting Job's final words to God as, "... I am fed up. I take pity on 'dust and ashes.'" In other words, "I take pity on humanity" (since that's what the ancient phrase "dust and ashes" meant back then), or to put it more frankly, "Oh, I see now, there is no divine justice, we're on our own." Which is a far cry from how we've typically understood Job's final words: "I repent in dust an ashes" according to the KJV. Or, "I'm sorry—forgive me," in Eugene H. Peterson’s plain language version.
And, the truth is, now that I've re-read the whole story, Job's unrepentant response does seem to make more sense. He and his friends are sitting there arguing over whether divine justice is perfect. Job is confident that he deserves better than he's gotten, and his friends are confident that his condition means he must have done something wrong. Job says there's plenty of evidence that the wicked go unpunished. His friends argue that our perspective is limited compared to that of God. Or maybe God's making him suffer as a test, in which case, he's still suffering because he's failed. He has, after all, lost his faith.
And then God comes in thundering about how powerful and all-knowing He is, never once addressing the issue of justice. In fact, all of His imagery is specifically amoral. What is Job to deduce but that, when it comes to God, justice is beside the point? When it comes to justice (on Earth at least), humanity is on its own.
This is the anti-prosperity Bible. Our prosperity is not a sign of being in God's good graces. Our suffering is not a sign of sin. We are dependent on one another for justice if we are to have it.
What's fascinating about this new interpretation is the paradox we're left with in the end. God seems at least a little interested in justice, or at least truth. He restores Job's health and wealth. God tells Job's three friends He is angry at them for not telling the truth like Job did, and tells them to make a sacrifice of bulls and rams to Job who will pray on their behalves. God adds double to what Job had before his misfortunes. Then Job's family and friends eat dinner with him and share their gold and silver with him. God blesses Job, but Job blesses his own children with their inheritance. Prosperity seems to have a mix of divine and human origins. And to the extent that God seems to reward truth and scold untruth, he's not entirely amoral.
We're left with an all-powerful but morally imperfect God. But if God were morally perfect, what responsibility would humans have to act morally courageous, what discernment would they need? Job's friends refuse to take responsibility, they rely entirely on traditional wisdom and assume that God takes care of justice. Job, on the other hand, insists on fighting for what he believes is right, even in the face of insuperable power. Now that is moral courage.
The gist is that this new translation upends the commonly understood message of Job by casting Job's final words to God as, "... I am fed up. I take pity on 'dust and ashes.'" In other words, "I take pity on humanity" (since that's what the ancient phrase "dust and ashes" meant back then), or to put it more frankly, "Oh, I see now, there is no divine justice, we're on our own." Which is a far cry from how we've typically understood Job's final words: "I repent in dust an ashes" according to the KJV. Or, "I'm sorry—forgive me," in Eugene H. Peterson’s plain language version.
And, the truth is, now that I've re-read the whole story, Job's unrepentant response does seem to make more sense. He and his friends are sitting there arguing over whether divine justice is perfect. Job is confident that he deserves better than he's gotten, and his friends are confident that his condition means he must have done something wrong. Job says there's plenty of evidence that the wicked go unpunished. His friends argue that our perspective is limited compared to that of God. Or maybe God's making him suffer as a test, in which case, he's still suffering because he's failed. He has, after all, lost his faith.
And then God comes in thundering about how powerful and all-knowing He is, never once addressing the issue of justice. In fact, all of His imagery is specifically amoral. What is Job to deduce but that, when it comes to God, justice is beside the point? When it comes to justice (on Earth at least), humanity is on its own.
This is the anti-prosperity Bible. Our prosperity is not a sign of being in God's good graces. Our suffering is not a sign of sin. We are dependent on one another for justice if we are to have it.
What's fascinating about this new interpretation is the paradox we're left with in the end. God seems at least a little interested in justice, or at least truth. He restores Job's health and wealth. God tells Job's three friends He is angry at them for not telling the truth like Job did, and tells them to make a sacrifice of bulls and rams to Job who will pray on their behalves. God adds double to what Job had before his misfortunes. Then Job's family and friends eat dinner with him and share their gold and silver with him. God blesses Job, but Job blesses his own children with their inheritance. Prosperity seems to have a mix of divine and human origins. And to the extent that God seems to reward truth and scold untruth, he's not entirely amoral.
We're left with an all-powerful but morally imperfect God. But if God were morally perfect, what responsibility would humans have to act morally courageous, what discernment would they need? Job's friends refuse to take responsibility, they rely entirely on traditional wisdom and assume that God takes care of justice. Job, on the other hand, insists on fighting for what he believes is right, even in the face of insuperable power. Now that is moral courage.
May 9, 2021
My kind of book. I've long been interested in Job. This scholar shows what a mess the book of Job is in detail. It seems there are tons of errors introduced by scribes mishearing or miscopying words. And there are tons of obscurities introduced by words imported from other local ancient languages. The author is expert in all of them and brings all this to bear through several decades of work. The author is also sensitive to and willing to see irony, humor, and mockery where more pious scholars would not. The bottom line is that Job is one of the weirdest and most wondrous books in the Hebrew scriptures.
March 21, 2022
"I cry out to you, but you do not answer;
I stand, and you just look at me.
You have turned cruel against me;
With your brute power you obstruct me.
You lift me to be carried off by the wind,
And you sweep me away in a tempest."
— Job 30:20-22
"I'm announcing loudly: 'I don't know what's going wrong!'
I've tried turning it off and then turning it back on!"
— Cheekface, No Connection
It was on the way to meet a friend in the city that I was intercepted by a street evangelist. "Are you a believer?" he asked, and before my brain could tell my mouth to shut up, I answered: "No." As a policy I don't debate religion with free-roaming theists, so instead I resigned myself to responding vaguely for however long it took for him to decide he'd started me on a conversion journey. This world, he instructed me, could not have come about by chance. It is too beautiful, too functional, too remarkable to be an accident—gravity, he said, was fine-tuned to one in a billion (whatever that means). He handed me a leaflet for his church and, with one last warning that I would burn in Hell forever if I didn't let the Christian deity into my heart, he said a cheerful goodbye.
At times like that, I think of the Book of Job.
In case you're not familiar, Job is the story of a man "whole in heart and straight of path", a servant of God who (it seems) is uniquely sinless. In the prologue, the heavenly accuser, the Satan, gets permission from God to kill Job's children and destroy his estate as a test of faith. When Job responds to this with superhuman equanimity ("YHWH has given, and YHWH has taken. May the name of YHWH be blessed."), the Satan attacks him personally. Job is plagued with rotting skin and festering boils. His corrupted flesh marks him as an outcast: once a man who lived in honour and affection, Job becomes a social pariah, repellant even to his wife. "Can we accept the good from Elohim and not accept the bad?" says Job, but his patience will not last long. His friends visit him but cannot find anything comforting to say and, after a week of silence, Job throws down the gauntlet. He knows he is innocent, and he knows his suffering is an arbitrary attack from a capricious and amoral God. No less than a meeting with the deity will convince him otherwise. Job's friends try by various means to talk Job down, insisting that God only punishes the wicked, and that there must be some sin Job has committed to earn His ire. The reader knows this is not true, of course, and when God does appear, He neither tells Job about the Satan's test, nor does He offer a consoling explanation of divine justice. Instead He says, more or less, that the strong owe no explanations to the weak, and this whole world is His property to play with as He likes. In the typical reading, this is where Job "repents" (for what exactly?)* and God restores him to twice his previous glory—ten new children and a whole lot of cattle. Job receives this reward for speaking the "truth" about God, while Job’s friends narrowly escape punishment for lying about God’s nature. Bear that in mind; we'll return to it.
Typical Christian readings of this tale cast Job as a man of faith* and patience, or they argue he is correctly put in his place for demanding God explain His unprovoked attack on Job's life and honour. God's plan is unknowable, these readings say, and His boastful, contemptuous ranting at the close of the book demonstrates just how beyond our understanding He is. We can rest assured, however, that His designs are ultimately benevolent: the wicked will not prosper in the next life, and the just will repose in unending happiness with well-formed souls. In so far as this reading can be ascribed to the text, it can only be done by somebody who has never truly read Job. You see, Job's friends offer the "God is good" boilerplate and are consequently threatened with an unseemly fate. That’s rather funny, but this moment troubles me, and it has for a long time. If God valued only meek obedience, Job's honesty would earn him no quarter, let alone a reward. His friends, in the meantime, would not have their lives threatened, despite their mistaken grasp of God's motivations. On the other hand, Job's honesty seems to offend God—how many people does He feel the need to explain himself to? How many people who preach his benevolence does He feel the need to punish? If Job is so insignificant, why does God regard him with such pride in the prologue? I don't have answers here, only questions.
*
If Job is a theodicy, it is a remarkably honest one. "Theodicy" means justification, or vindication, of God. Theodicies address the so-called "problem" of evil, and seek to explain why a just God would set this globe spinning and populate it only to let its inhabitants suffer. A typically facile theodicy is the rationalism of Leibniz, who took as his starting point the view that God is all-powerful, all-knowing and infinitely good, so by definition this world must be the best of all possible worlds. This presupposes a human conception of "good" that is nowhere in Job, which instead presents a God who is not concerned with an abstract "good", but personal right, a mastery that will not recognize the moral claims of "dust and ashes"—human beings. In a certain sense, Job is really an anti-theodicy: God needs no vindication from us. To understand where God is coming from, you need only imagine what would happen if an ant submitted a letter of complaint to a construction company for destroying its nest. Morality does not meaningfully operate when such disparities of power, right, and interest are present. What theodicies would the non-human inhabitants of the natural world write? And how miserable would they make us to read?
This brings me back to the street evangelist. He, like many other (but by no means all) religious people, believes in a version of God whose contradictions amount to impossibility. This benevolent being manufactured a world so complicated that its very existence attests to His goodness. He will forgive any sin, pardon any transgression. But in His infinite moral wisdom, He sees no problem in subjecting his creations to infinite torment if they simply fail to believe in Him. This doesn't sound like a relationship of respect or care; it sounds like a relationship of despotic power. One that Job—because of, and not in spite of, his fundamental moral and intellectual decency—was happy to denounce to the face of the deity.
All relationships of despotic power have rationalisations, vindications, dogmatic defenses. But Job is ultimately rewarded for fighting* even as he correctly grasped the futility of his case. I wonder if there is some lesson that can be taken from this.
-- NOTES --
(1) A quick note on Job's "repentance"—Greenstein, the translator, renders Job's final lines as: "That is why I am fed up; I take pity on "dust and ashes!" (emphasis mine). After hearing God belittle him as an insignificant nothing from a species of dubious value and little interest, Job—far from repenting—expresses defiance. God is pitiless; Job knows this from hard experience. He will not be cowed into expressing a view of God that is at odds with His behaviour. It seems that this may be what earns Job his reward.
(2) Certainly it is interesting that Job does not abandon a belief in God. What he does is far more radical, denouncing God as being uninterested in human standards of justice, if not an actual sadist (see some of Job’s more impassioned rants about the injustice of being born).
(3) There's something troubling in this reading in that it’s the deity he challenges who rewards him. Hard to imagine an oil company rewarding you for [REDACTED], for example.
I stand, and you just look at me.
You have turned cruel against me;
With your brute power you obstruct me.
You lift me to be carried off by the wind,
And you sweep me away in a tempest."
— Job 30:20-22
"I'm announcing loudly: 'I don't know what's going wrong!'
I've tried turning it off and then turning it back on!"
— Cheekface, No Connection
It was on the way to meet a friend in the city that I was intercepted by a street evangelist. "Are you a believer?" he asked, and before my brain could tell my mouth to shut up, I answered: "No." As a policy I don't debate religion with free-roaming theists, so instead I resigned myself to responding vaguely for however long it took for him to decide he'd started me on a conversion journey. This world, he instructed me, could not have come about by chance. It is too beautiful, too functional, too remarkable to be an accident—gravity, he said, was fine-tuned to one in a billion (whatever that means). He handed me a leaflet for his church and, with one last warning that I would burn in Hell forever if I didn't let the Christian deity into my heart, he said a cheerful goodbye.
At times like that, I think of the Book of Job.
In case you're not familiar, Job is the story of a man "whole in heart and straight of path", a servant of God who (it seems) is uniquely sinless. In the prologue, the heavenly accuser, the Satan, gets permission from God to kill Job's children and destroy his estate as a test of faith. When Job responds to this with superhuman equanimity ("YHWH has given, and YHWH has taken. May the name of YHWH be blessed."), the Satan attacks him personally. Job is plagued with rotting skin and festering boils. His corrupted flesh marks him as an outcast: once a man who lived in honour and affection, Job becomes a social pariah, repellant even to his wife. "Can we accept the good from Elohim and not accept the bad?" says Job, but his patience will not last long. His friends visit him but cannot find anything comforting to say and, after a week of silence, Job throws down the gauntlet. He knows he is innocent, and he knows his suffering is an arbitrary attack from a capricious and amoral God. No less than a meeting with the deity will convince him otherwise. Job's friends try by various means to talk Job down, insisting that God only punishes the wicked, and that there must be some sin Job has committed to earn His ire. The reader knows this is not true, of course, and when God does appear, He neither tells Job about the Satan's test, nor does He offer a consoling explanation of divine justice. Instead He says, more or less, that the strong owe no explanations to the weak, and this whole world is His property to play with as He likes. In the typical reading, this is where Job "repents" (for what exactly?)* and God restores him to twice his previous glory—ten new children and a whole lot of cattle. Job receives this reward for speaking the "truth" about God, while Job’s friends narrowly escape punishment for lying about God’s nature. Bear that in mind; we'll return to it.
Typical Christian readings of this tale cast Job as a man of faith* and patience, or they argue he is correctly put in his place for demanding God explain His unprovoked attack on Job's life and honour. God's plan is unknowable, these readings say, and His boastful, contemptuous ranting at the close of the book demonstrates just how beyond our understanding He is. We can rest assured, however, that His designs are ultimately benevolent: the wicked will not prosper in the next life, and the just will repose in unending happiness with well-formed souls. In so far as this reading can be ascribed to the text, it can only be done by somebody who has never truly read Job. You see, Job's friends offer the "God is good" boilerplate and are consequently threatened with an unseemly fate. That’s rather funny, but this moment troubles me, and it has for a long time. If God valued only meek obedience, Job's honesty would earn him no quarter, let alone a reward. His friends, in the meantime, would not have their lives threatened, despite their mistaken grasp of God's motivations. On the other hand, Job's honesty seems to offend God—how many people does He feel the need to explain himself to? How many people who preach his benevolence does He feel the need to punish? If Job is so insignificant, why does God regard him with such pride in the prologue? I don't have answers here, only questions.
*
If Job is a theodicy, it is a remarkably honest one. "Theodicy" means justification, or vindication, of God. Theodicies address the so-called "problem" of evil, and seek to explain why a just God would set this globe spinning and populate it only to let its inhabitants suffer. A typically facile theodicy is the rationalism of Leibniz, who took as his starting point the view that God is all-powerful, all-knowing and infinitely good, so by definition this world must be the best of all possible worlds. This presupposes a human conception of "good" that is nowhere in Job, which instead presents a God who is not concerned with an abstract "good", but personal right, a mastery that will not recognize the moral claims of "dust and ashes"—human beings. In a certain sense, Job is really an anti-theodicy: God needs no vindication from us. To understand where God is coming from, you need only imagine what would happen if an ant submitted a letter of complaint to a construction company for destroying its nest. Morality does not meaningfully operate when such disparities of power, right, and interest are present. What theodicies would the non-human inhabitants of the natural world write? And how miserable would they make us to read?
This brings me back to the street evangelist. He, like many other (but by no means all) religious people, believes in a version of God whose contradictions amount to impossibility. This benevolent being manufactured a world so complicated that its very existence attests to His goodness. He will forgive any sin, pardon any transgression. But in His infinite moral wisdom, He sees no problem in subjecting his creations to infinite torment if they simply fail to believe in Him. This doesn't sound like a relationship of respect or care; it sounds like a relationship of despotic power. One that Job—because of, and not in spite of, his fundamental moral and intellectual decency—was happy to denounce to the face of the deity.
All relationships of despotic power have rationalisations, vindications, dogmatic defenses. But Job is ultimately rewarded for fighting* even as he correctly grasped the futility of his case. I wonder if there is some lesson that can be taken from this.
-- NOTES --
(1) A quick note on Job's "repentance"—Greenstein, the translator, renders Job's final lines as: "That is why I am fed up; I take pity on "dust and ashes!" (emphasis mine). After hearing God belittle him as an insignificant nothing from a species of dubious value and little interest, Job—far from repenting—expresses defiance. God is pitiless; Job knows this from hard experience. He will not be cowed into expressing a view of God that is at odds with His behaviour. It seems that this may be what earns Job his reward.
(2) Certainly it is interesting that Job does not abandon a belief in God. What he does is far more radical, denouncing God as being uninterested in human standards of justice, if not an actual sadist (see some of Job’s more impassioned rants about the injustice of being born).
(3) There's something troubling in this reading in that it’s the deity he challenges who rewards him. Hard to imagine an oil company rewarding you for [REDACTED], for example.
January 5, 2020
Greenstein is clearly very deeply familiar with the text of Job, and provides a wonderfully thorough annotation to his translation that enables even a reader unfamiliar with Hebrew to keep up with his decisions and conclusions about the themes and structure of the text. He lays out a reading of Job in which the titular character lays out a lawsuit against God over his undeserved suffering, reflecting on and lamenting over divine injustice while refuting the conventional moral wisdom of his friends. As a reader with a Christian background, I found the lack of Christian influence in analysis of the text to be deeply refreshing, as it enables the translation to retain the full force of Job's criticism of conventional images of deity that often seems lost when translated or interpreted in Christian contexts. Regardless of religious tradition, I wholly recommend this to everyone as a wonderful piece of ancient poetry that carries a profound and relevant criticism of traditional images of God.
October 10, 2025
hilarious to review a book of bible but. it was an interesting time! Repetitive in the middle but cool read for class
April 15, 2022
The Book of Job in the Hebrew Scriptures has always fascinated me. I read somewhere recently about this book by Edward Greenstein regarding his very different approach to the text of Job. Turns out he's not just a guy who wanted to do a new translation of the the Book of Job. Greenstein is a world-renowned scholar, of over 50 years, in many areas of biblical and ancient Near Eastern studies. Prof. Greenstein is Professor Emeritus of Bible at Bar-Ilan University. He received the EMET Prize -- equivalent to “Israel’s Nobel” in Humanities-Biblical Studies for 2020. This book, published in 2019, won the acclaim from many organizations, including the American Library Association, the Association for Jewish Studies, etc.
Greenstein makes it clear that the Book of Job has for decades been one of the most difficult texts to translate. He sums it up this way: "...in the book of Psalms there is no connection between one chapter and the next; in the book of Proverbs there is no connection between one verse and the next; in the book of Job there is no connection between one word and the next..."
One of the biggest revelations for me in reading this book is the passage in Chapter 42, verse 6. I will leave it to readers who are interested in reading this book to discover Greenstein's take on this, based on decades of his research. But he does give a hint at the end of his Preface: "In short, the work is not mainly about what you thought it was; it is more subversive than you imagined, and it ends in a manner that glorifies the best in human values."
Greenstein makes it clear that the Book of Job has for decades been one of the most difficult texts to translate. He sums it up this way: "...in the book of Psalms there is no connection between one chapter and the next; in the book of Proverbs there is no connection between one verse and the next; in the book of Job there is no connection between one word and the next..."
One of the biggest revelations for me in reading this book is the passage in Chapter 42, verse 6. I will leave it to readers who are interested in reading this book to discover Greenstein's take on this, based on decades of his research. But he does give a hint at the end of his Preface: "In short, the work is not mainly about what you thought it was; it is more subversive than you imagined, and it ends in a manner that glorifies the best in human values."
November 13, 2019
I will admit I bit off more than I could chew with this book. I lack the knowledge to truly judge the translation and while the issues raised were in some ways fascinating, I really only finished it so that because I had invested time and energy in reading half of it. It is a provocative book by an eminent scholar but I think the line between scholar and educated layperson is a tricky one. I found the translation readable and the introduction thought provoking but I was constantly distracted by the footnotes and a sense that Greenstien was flipping the understanding of Job on its head and I was in no position to judge the result in any definitive way absent significant study and reading. As with so much, your mileage may vary but if you like challenging approaches to scripture this is that. At the very least you understand the immense challenges involved in translating a work such as Job.
March 11, 2020
Greenstein here shows some of the flaws of the doctrinally biased Christian translators who make most translations of the Bible, warping its meanings a great deal from their natural readings as read by scholars of the language. He corrects those things for the book of Job, giving detailed explanations as to why he translates things he does, and ultimately it shows a very different Job:
Traditional translation:
"I despise myself, and I repent in dust and ashes"
Greenstein's translation:
"And so I am fed up; I take pity on the dust and the ashes"
And so the poem becomes what it was always meant to be: a man unjustly wronged by the world, who sees God's power and lack of action, and whose lawsuit against God goes eventually unanswered. When Job sees God, he sees God as a purveyor of power rather than justice. "I've seen you, I understand you now. It's made me angry; I pity mankind, that has you for a god."
Traditional translation:
"I despise myself, and I repent in dust and ashes"
Greenstein's translation:
"And so I am fed up; I take pity on the dust and the ashes"
And so the poem becomes what it was always meant to be: a man unjustly wronged by the world, who sees God's power and lack of action, and whose lawsuit against God goes eventually unanswered. When Job sees God, he sees God as a purveyor of power rather than justice. "I've seen you, I understand you now. It's made me angry; I pity mankind, that has you for a god."
June 2, 2025
However, the meanings of many words and expressions in Job are based on guesswork. One is often hard-pressed to reconcile the language of the translations with the traditional Hebrew text. There is no delicate way to put it: much of what has passed as translation of Job is facile and fudged. Translators have for the most part recycled interpretations that had been adopted earlier, dispensing with the painstaking work of original philological investigation that might lead to new and proper understandings.
He more than wild beasts instructs us;
More than birds of the sky makes us wise.
When they cry out, and he does not answer--
It's because of the bad people's pride.
For El will not hear insincerity;
Shaddai will not look at it.
All the more to your saying,
"You do not look at it!"
The matter's before him,
And you must wait.
For he neither punishes in anger,
Nor greatly harms the sinner.
Yet Job widens his mouth with wind;
He multiplies words without knowledge.
Edward L. Greenstein's annotated translation of Job, four-decades in the wrestling, is breath-taking. Job has always been an enigma to me--the saga of a wronged man who did no wrong who is rebuked by God for complaining he has been wronged. It's a real head-scratcher.
Greenstein's annotations reveal the complexity of the text and explain why, as a translator, he makes the choices he does in moving lines--even whole chapters--around. His take on copying errors--"the copyist made a mistake so much started over again, leaving the mistake in the text"--is fascinating. Instead of deconstructing the text to such a degree that I can have no faith in what it says, Greenstein imbues this rich tale with profundity and wonder.
Suffice to say: This is REQUIRED reading of anyone who wants to wrestle with this book. After Greenstein guides you through the text you'll never look at this book without awe again. I really enjoyed this translation.
Up spoke Job to YHWH and he said:
I have known you are able to do all;
That you cannot be blocked from any scheme.
"Who is this hiding counsel without knowledge?"
Truly I've spoken without comprehending--
Wonders beyond me that I do not know.
"Hear now and I will speak!
I will ask you, and you help me know!"
As a hearing by the ear I have heard you,
And now my eye has seen you.
That is why I am fed up;
I take pity on "dust and ashes!"
No one can read Job without research, rumination, imagination, and speculation. The experience of reading a translation of Job, in which interpretative choices have already been made and served, cannot be compared to the exasperating grappling of the translator with the challenges of the Joban text.
He more than wild beasts instructs us;
More than birds of the sky makes us wise.
When they cry out, and he does not answer--
It's because of the bad people's pride.
For El will not hear insincerity;
Shaddai will not look at it.
All the more to your saying,
"You do not look at it!"
The matter's before him,
And you must wait.
For he neither punishes in anger,
Nor greatly harms the sinner.
Yet Job widens his mouth with wind;
He multiplies words without knowledge.
Edward L. Greenstein's annotated translation of Job, four-decades in the wrestling, is breath-taking. Job has always been an enigma to me--the saga of a wronged man who did no wrong who is rebuked by God for complaining he has been wronged. It's a real head-scratcher.
Greenstein's annotations reveal the complexity of the text and explain why, as a translator, he makes the choices he does in moving lines--even whole chapters--around. His take on copying errors--"the copyist made a mistake so much started over again, leaving the mistake in the text"--is fascinating. Instead of deconstructing the text to such a degree that I can have no faith in what it says, Greenstein imbues this rich tale with profundity and wonder.
Suffice to say: This is REQUIRED reading of anyone who wants to wrestle with this book. After Greenstein guides you through the text you'll never look at this book without awe again. I really enjoyed this translation.
Up spoke Job to YHWH and he said:
I have known you are able to do all;
That you cannot be blocked from any scheme.
"Who is this hiding counsel without knowledge?"
Truly I've spoken without comprehending--
Wonders beyond me that I do not know.
"Hear now and I will speak!
I will ask you, and you help me know!"
As a hearing by the ear I have heard you,
And now my eye has seen you.
That is why I am fed up;
I take pity on "dust and ashes!"
No one can read Job without research, rumination, imagination, and speculation. The experience of reading a translation of Job, in which interpretative choices have already been made and served, cannot be compared to the exasperating grappling of the translator with the challenges of the Joban text.
May 2, 2022
The Book of Job is a notoriously difficult but powerful work and Edward Greenstein’s crisp, beautiful translation is the one I’d now point people to for their first reading. (I still highly recommend the Stephen Mitchell translation, but Greenstein’s has a little more academic heft and experience behind it.) It provides a framework – and an interpretive underpinning – that makes this seminal work eminently more readable and enjoyable.
Job is a difficult work confused by centuries of poor transcriptions and tinkering hands. Even in it’s original Hebrew it presents many challenges with the poet creatively using vocabulary, syntax and form. The sheer creativity, playfulness and genius are what make it so beautiful, but so difficult, too.
And that’s what I appreciate about Greenstein’s translation. Some translators, in the process of translation, try to simplify the complex to make it easier to understand. But that’s more of an explication than a translation. The Book of Job should be odd, challenging, and cryptic. And Greenstein does a good job of achieving that feel.
Eventually, if you don’t want to learn Hebrew, the reader of Job wants to get to the King James Version, which is a revelation by itself. But start here and get an understanding the story, then dip into the whirlwind which is the King James Version.
Job is a difficult work confused by centuries of poor transcriptions and tinkering hands. Even in it’s original Hebrew it presents many challenges with the poet creatively using vocabulary, syntax and form. The sheer creativity, playfulness and genius are what make it so beautiful, but so difficult, too.
And that’s what I appreciate about Greenstein’s translation. Some translators, in the process of translation, try to simplify the complex to make it easier to understand. But that’s more of an explication than a translation. The Book of Job should be odd, challenging, and cryptic. And Greenstein does a good job of achieving that feel.
Eventually, if you don’t want to learn Hebrew, the reader of Job wants to get to the King James Version, which is a revelation by itself. But start here and get an understanding the story, then dip into the whirlwind which is the King James Version.
June 21, 2021
very fun and light hearted read 😍
April 19, 2022
I'm just confused.
Super interesting, really cool translation. But I need to go think now lol.
Super interesting, really cool translation. But I need to go think now lol.
September 12, 2022
Greenstein’s insight into a fresh perspective of Job challenges, delights, and resets traditional interpretations. The depth of his work is astounding.
July 4, 2022
Tremendous translation
I have long been a fan of the book of Job. I have read several books on it and the book itself many times. Greenstein's translation is fresh and well footnotef. I found myself bouncing between his translation and others like the NET. With Greenstein's insights I feel a greater depth to my faith!
I have long been a fan of the book of Job. I have read several books on it and the book itself many times. Greenstein's translation is fresh and well footnotef. I found myself bouncing between his translation and others like the NET. With Greenstein's insights I feel a greater depth to my faith!
June 19, 2023
This is a wild, weird translation of Job. Greenstein is committed to reconstructing the original text's shape, meaning, and poetic force. He's willing to do a lot of guesswork and take risks with a book whose original text is stitched together from multiple versions and written in at least two languages. Greenstein's talents as a philologist and a poet serve him extremely well: his Job feels startlingly fresh and frightening...and uniquely Jewish, too. Sometimes this translation reads like dark Yiddish theater. Greenstein foregrounds the sarcasm and humor of the book; Job kvetches and his companions scold him with frightening metaphors written in effective Hebrew parallel structure. It's a fast, thrilling read. Greenstein's Introduction is also fantastic, full of informed speculation about the purpose, authors, and audience of Job.
It's hard not to compare Greenstein's approach to Job with Robert Alter's magisterial translation of the Hebrew Bible. Alter clearly felt great responsibility while translating the Bible. He labored under the weight of the seriousness of his endeavor: he knew his translation would be influential and widely read, and he translated accordingly, carefully. You can sometimes feel him straining as he writes. Greenstein is downright mad by comparison, in the best way possible, and he clearly had a blast working with this remarkable narrative.
It's hard not to compare Greenstein's approach to Job with Robert Alter's magisterial translation of the Hebrew Bible. Alter clearly felt great responsibility while translating the Bible. He labored under the weight of the seriousness of his endeavor: he knew his translation would be influential and widely read, and he translated accordingly, carefully. You can sometimes feel him straining as he writes. Greenstein is downright mad by comparison, in the best way possible, and he clearly had a blast working with this remarkable narrative.
November 1, 2019
Job: A New Translation
JOB: A New Translation makes Job easier to understand, not only as the Book in the Bible, but also as Job as a man.
The biblical book of Job is confusing. It can be hard to determine who is speaking to whom. Is Job speaking directly to God or is he speaking to one of his three friends? Is Job speaking against God or is he a faithful man of God?
Mr. Greenstein separates the conversations and explains the context of the many different discourses. He gives insight to the varying translations and how some words have been, in the past, misused. His translation made the plights of Job so much easier to understand and follow.
JOB: A New Translation makes Job easier to understand, not only as the Book in the Bible, but also as Job as a man.
The biblical book of Job is confusing. It can be hard to determine who is speaking to whom. Is Job speaking directly to God or is he speaking to one of his three friends? Is Job speaking against God or is he a faithful man of God?
Mr. Greenstein separates the conversations and explains the context of the many different discourses. He gives insight to the varying translations and how some words have been, in the past, misused. His translation made the plights of Job so much easier to understand and follow.
June 19, 2023
Is Job ultimately humbled by God? or does Job prevail over God? God’s speeches to Job in chapters 38-41 have traditionally been understood as a “cosmic putdown” to which Job acquiesces – Greenstein presents a case to the contrary. In the epilogue, God exalts Job saying he “spoke about me what is right” (42:7). Greenstein’s translation largely resolves the conflict between the putdown and exaltation found in the last chapters of Job. Job prevails because his speech is honest and right. Even when Job comes face-to-face with a deity seemingly indifferent to the injustice he’s experienced, Job remains defiant. As a result, his court case against God, which builds throughout the book, ends in vindication. I’ll never read the book of Job quite the same way again thanks to Greenstein. 5/5.
October 7, 2019
Greenstein’s translation is very accessible and the paragraphs introducing each Discourse or Response (as well as some sub-sections) provide helpful context. The go-to source for Job readers for decades to come. The extensive footnotes, however, are often geared to the academics and scholars referencing other liturgy or translation decisions. These broke up the other more straightforward illustrative or explanatory footnotes that enriched the reading. Surely the author and editor’s prerogative to structure as they see fit but it would have been a less tedious read were the different types of footnotes distinguished visually. All that said, a very worthwhile read.
November 11, 2019
Having read Job many times, being my second favorite book of the Hebrew Testament, I wanted to tackle a good scholarly book on Job. This definitely met that definition. The author's advanced knowledge of the text is clear and there are many interesting points raised in this book. That being said this is truly a textbook examination of Job presented by numbered bullet points and not straight page turning translation. Some of the points would only be of interest to the linguists and not so much to the rest of us. All in all, the author demonstrated a master understanding of Job but it may be difficult to follow if you are not a fellow scholar on the same level.
March 26, 2021
It's safe to say 99.999% of people (myself included - prior to reading this work of scholarship) have little clue what the ORIGINAL "said" - and meant, given the context, idioms, etc.
One of so many examples of how, alas, "The King James Bible" - has come to be accepted - wrongly - as a work of divine interpretation by objective scribes - rather than a biased transcription - in service off a (a largely unwholesome) political agenda
Well worth the read - though the author is a bit over the top at times in terms of HIS special gnosis; after all he's just one man too - most of Notes can be ignored - apart from you PhD students out there
One of so many examples of how, alas, "The King James Bible" - has come to be accepted - wrongly - as a work of divine interpretation by objective scribes - rather than a biased transcription - in service off a (a largely unwholesome) political agenda
Well worth the read - though the author is a bit over the top at times in terms of HIS special gnosis; after all he's just one man too - most of Notes can be ignored - apart from you PhD students out there
April 6, 2020
This is not the King James version of this book of the Bible which is the whole point of a new translation. What you get is an engaging and understandable text with lots of useful footnotes. As a former English teacher, I was always a fan of this proto-existentialist text but was sometimes frustrated by its density. This new translation provided more insights and helped me newly appreciate this longtime favorite. Don't let the lengthy and challenging preface deter me; I'd even say to skip it altogether unless you'd like to know more about the process of translation.
April 12, 2023
This was an interesting read, diving into an "updated?" translation of Job and getting to see how Greenstein uses historical and language criticism to shape translations of certain tricky linguistic passages, in the original Hebrew/biblical language.
Overall, especially at a time like this when the hardships and injustices of the world feel magnified and close to home, it has been life-giving and meaningful to read through this book. Thinking about theodicy, care, and the sovereignty of God has proven a blessing.
Overall, especially at a time like this when the hardships and injustices of the world feel magnified and close to home, it has been life-giving and meaningful to read through this book. Thinking about theodicy, care, and the sovereignty of God has proven a blessing.
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June 6, 2024YWHWY was originally a minor storm god to the Casnanites? And it is obvious it was originally a storm god in Job. Lots of references to Egyptian culture and influence. Job “You’re a powerful diety…sure, ok, but I feel sorry for humanity.” YWHWY - “You get it, here’s all your stuff back!” Simone Weil’s observation - bystanders to suffering simply can’t not sit by and give attention to the suffering of others - they have to explain it away….if you explain away the suffering of others (homeless did something to deserve being homeless, etc) make same mistakes as Job’s attendants
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 19, 2025
I really enjoyed this, especially the final chapters. It was fascinating to see some insights from a language expert regarding his translation choices. The choice to place chapter 28 at the end of Elihu's response made so much sense to me, once I'd read it! Even though, as a Christian, I would draw different conclusions from some of his interpretations, in general this translation expanded my mind and challenged my thinking in many ways.
July 11, 2019
Job is a rich text, and one that I have used in my teaching at a variety of levels. Edward L. Greenstein provides an insightful look into this complex book, and one I was glad to read as someone who returns to this book often in work.
Highly recommended as a text for personal study, as well as for course-based focus on Biblical texts.
Highly recommended as a text for personal study, as well as for course-based focus on Biblical texts.
September 30, 2019
I really appreciate how this book is organized; easy to follow the author’s suggested interpretations and ideas.
Further, I love the fact that the author introduced a new perspective on Job that I had not heard before; well worth consideration!
Further, I love the fact that the author introduced a new perspective on Job that I had not heard before; well worth consideration!
January 1, 2020
This is an intense scholarly work, clearly a lifetime's labor of love. Even if one is not a student of ancient languages, the intimations that the book of Job packs more ironies and subversive suggestions than heretofore thought are catnip to any admirer of Job.
September 18, 2020
Very thorough. Not the best for a casual read if you're not well versed. I may revisit this title at another time, as the subject matter interesting me and I can appreciate the proof of the author's research.
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March 8, 2024A thoroughly impressive work, both in the scope of its research and in the lengths the translator went to to make the work both an accurate translation and understandable to a modern audience or layman (like myself). I enjoyed this a lot.
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