Yet shalt thou plunge me in the ditch, and mine own clothes shall abhor me.
Job 9:31 belongs to Job's reply within his argument about the cause and purpose of human suffering, in a book dealing with the great problems of an overruling providence and of sin and suffering. Affliction is no proof of sin or of divine displeasure, for Job is upright and tried, whom God is disciplining and bringing through the fire of affliction. His three friends charge him with sin and declare his sufferings are because of sin, misapplying claims about suffering that are generally true and showing how humanity misjudges its fellows.
The Hebrew verb tabal, also spelled tah-val, means to dip, immerse or plunge, not to sprinkle, picturing Job as plunged into the ditch. The Hebrew preposition governing the ditch means in or into. This is the word's one occurrence rendered as plunge, while its other occurrences are rendered as dip. Its Septuagint translation ebapses likewise means dipping, supporting the distinction between immersion and sprinkling.
Job 9:31 belongs to Job's reply within his argument about the cause and purpose of human suffering, in a book dealing with the great problems of an overruling providence and of sin and suffering. Affliction is no proof of sin or of divine displeasure, for Job is upright and tried, whom God is disciplining and bringing through the fire of affliction. His three friends charge him with sin and declare his sufferings are because of sin, misapplying claims about suffering that are generally true and showing how humanity misjudges its fellows.
The Hebrew verb tabal, also spelled tah-val, means to dip, immerse or plunge, not to sprinkle, picturing Job as plunged into the ditch. The Hebrew preposition governing the ditch means in or into. This is the word's one occurrence rendered as plunge, while its other occurrences are rendered as dip. Its Septuagint translation ebapses likewise means dipping, supporting the distinction between immersion and sprinkling.