וַיַּעַן אִיּוֹב וַיֹּאמַר׃

Job answered and said:

מֶה־עָזַרְתָּ לְלֹא כֹחַ הוֹשַׁעְתָּ זְרוֹעַ לֹא־עֹז

How you have helped without power! How can you claim to have helped, when you have no power? You have saved with a powerless arm! In what sense have you saved, when your arm is without strength?

מַה־יָּעַצְתָּ לְלֹא חָכְמָה וְתֻשִׁיָּה לָרֹב הוֹדָעְתָּ

How you have counseled without wisdom; you have sought to give counsel when you have no wisdom. And do you imagine that you have shown much resourcefulness?

אֶת־מִי הִגַּדְתָּ מִלִּין וְנִשְׁמַת־מִי יָצְאָה מִמֶּךָּ

To whom have you related these words? For whom do you feel that your banal comments were considered a novelty? And whose spirit emerged from you? What spirit rested upon you that enabled you to speak such lofty words of wisdom? Job thus rejects Bildad’s argument with sarcastic derision.

הָרְפָאִים יְחוֹלָלוּ מִתַּחַת מַיִם וְשֹׁכְנֵיהֶם

Job now provides his own description of God’s greatness, power, and awe. The dead will tremble beneath the water and its dwellers, in the netherworld.

עָרוֹם שְׁאוֹל נֶגְדּוֹ וְאֵין כְּסוּת לַאֲבַדּוֹן

The grave is bare, exposed, before Him, and destruction has no cover. They are both clearly revealed before God.

נֹטֶה צָפוֹן עַל־תֹּהוּ תֹּלֶה אֶרֶץ עַל־בְּלִימָה

He spreads the north over emptiness and suspends the earth over nothingness. His creation is wondrous, and its essence is beyond all logic.

צֹרֵר מַיִם בְּעָבָיו וְלֹא־נִבְקַע עָנָן תַּחְתָּם

He amasses water in His clouds, and the cloud does not burst due to it. Despite the weight of the water they contain, the clouds do not burst open; rather, they let their water out in drops.

מְאַחֵז פְּנֵי־כִסֵּה פַּרְשֵׁז עָלָיו עֲנָנוֹ

He grasps the surface of His throne, a metaphor for heaven, and spreads His cloud over it, His throne, the firmament in the sky.

חֹק חָג עַל־פְּנֵי־מָיִם עַד־תַּכְלִית אוֹר עִם־חֹשֶׁךְ

He has circumscribed a boundary, in the form of an encompassing line, on the surface of the water. God set a limit upon the sea so that its waters should not flood the land. Alternatively, the boundary refers to the sky, which surrounds all the different bodies of waters in a great circle (22:14). This boundary reaches until the far reaches of light and darkness, the edges where light meets darkness, that is, the limits of reality.

עַמּוּדֵי שָׁמַיִם יְרוֹפָפוּ וְיִתְמְהוּ מִגַּעֲרָתוֹ

The world and all that it contains have no defense against Him: The pillars of heaven sag, are weakened, and they are undermined by His castigation.

בְּכֹחוֹ רָגַע הַיָּם וּבִתְבוּנָתוֹ מָחַץ רָהַב

With His power, He has calmed the sea, and with His understanding, He crushed Rahav, a kind of whale or sea monster which represents the forces of rebellion against God.

בְּרוּחוֹ שָׁמַיִם שִׁפְרָה חֹלְלָה יָדוֹ נָחָשׁ בָּרִחַ

With His wind, the heavens are enhanced, as God’s spirit fixes the heavens; His hand has slain the bar serpent, Rahav, mentioned in the previous verse. God creates mysterious, incomprehensible worlds, and He also strikes and destroys the forces of chaos.

הֶן־אֵלֶּה קְצוֹת דְּרָכָו וּמַה־שֵּׁמֶץ דָּבָר נִשְׁמַע־בּוֹ וְרַעַם גְּבוּרֹתָו מִי יִתְבּוֹנָן

Behold, these matters I spoke of here are but the edges of His ways, and how but a trace of His full greatness is heard about Him. Who can understand the whole thunder of His might in all its power? No one can grasp the full might of God. Job accepts Bildad’s claim about God’s greatness and power, and goes even further, depicting those strengths of God that do not provide harmony on earth. Yet, while Bildad inferred from the reality of God’s power that a human cannot emerge victorious in his contentions with the Divine, Job remains silent in that regard. It is clear from the context that his silence is a refusal to accept Bildad’s conclusion. Job insists that his recognition of God’s greatness does not mean that he must refrain from complaining. Perhaps Job is arguing that his friends, who have based their claims on wisdom, actually have limited access to true wisdom, which belongs to God alone. Nevertheless, it is also possible that in this speech, Job is less reactive to his friends. Rather, he is giving expression to his own confrontation with his current pitiful state. If so, then he is acknowledging the inability of human intelligence to find explanations for the unfathomable situation in which he finds himself.