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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 May 2021
Edward L. Greenstein, who has recently published a most accomplished translation of the biblical book of Job, gives an indication of the extent of the labor required to produce such a translation: “I have been deeply engaged by the challenges of the book of Job—its themes, literary affiliations, language, and poetics—for over four decades” (xvii). That Greenstein has more than endured what he rightly characterizes as “this intimate endeavor” (xvii), including especially “the painstaking work of original philological investigation” (xviii), demonstrates that he is not only a long-suffering “scholar of difficult language” but indeed a “lover of words,” and of the work of words (ix). Further proof of his love lies in the stated altruism of his goals (xvii). He has aimed “to make good sense of the text of Job” and “to convey something of the text’s poetics” (x, xxxvi). That is, he has tried to recreate in English something of the theological and literary genius of the ancient Joban writers, better than others have done previously. And fellow students of Job and lovers of words, including the present author, owe a debt of gratitude to Greenstein for his labor of love and this work of translation. For, true to his goals, the still enigmatic biblical book begins to make (stunning) good sense and, here and there, lays bare more of its (sinuous) literary genius in Greenstein’s new translation.1
Edward L. Greenstein, Job: A New Translation (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2019), 248 pp., $26.00 hb., ISBN 9780300162349. Page references appear in parentheses within the text.
1 The book includes a helpful bibliography, “The Author’s Publications on or Touching on Job,” on pp. 189–92. Due to the pandemic caused by SARS-CoV-2 and the related closure of research libraries, I was not able to access many of the works.
2 Edward L. Greenstein, “Theories of Modern Bible Translation,” in his Essays on Biblical Method and Translation (Atlanta: Scholars, 2020) 85–118, at 102–3.
3 Ibid., 103.
4 Ibid., 102.
5 Eugene A. Nida and Charles R. Taber, The Theory and Practice of Translation (Leiden: Brill, 1974) 4–5, cited in Greenstein, “Theories of Modern Bible Translation,” 104
6 Greenstein, “Theories of Modern Bible Translation,” 86; see the detailed discussion, 86–102.
7 Ibid., 102.
8 Ibid., 93.
9 Ibid., 105.
10 If tempted to respond “pain,” consider, Walter Benjamin, “The Task of the Translator,” in Walter Benjamin: Selected Writings, Volume 1: 1913—1926 (ed. Marcus Bullock and Michael W. Jennings; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1996) 253–63, at 257.
11 See also Edward L. Greenstein, “Challenges in Translating the Book of Job,” in Found in Translation: Essays on Jewish Biblical Translation in Honor of Leonard J. Greenspoon (ed. James W. Barker, Anthony Le Donne, and Joel N. Lohr; West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2018) 179–99, at 180.
12 Edward L. Greenstein, “Features of Language in the Poetry of Job,” in Das Buch Hiob und seine Interpretationen. Beiträge zum Hiob-Symposium auf dem Monte Verità vom 14.—19. August 2005 (ed. T. Krüger et al.; Zürich: TVZ, 2007) 81-96, at 85.
13 Ibid.
14 Ibid., 86.
15 Ibid.
16 See also Edward L. Greenstein, “In Job’s Face/Facing Job,” in The Labour of Reading: Desire, Alienation, and Biblical Interpretation (ed. Fiona C. Black, Roland Boer, and Erin Runions; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1999) 301–17; Paul K.-K. Cho, “Job the Penitent: Whether and Why Job Repents,” in Landscapes of Korean and Korean American Biblical Interpretation (ed. John Ahn; Atlanta: SBL Press, 2019) 145–74.
17 John E. Hartley, The Book of Job (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1988) 342.
18 John Briggs Curtis, “On Job’s Response to Yahweh,” JBL 89 (1979) 497–511, at 510.
19 See Cho, “Job the Penitent,” 150–54.
20 Ibid., 148–50.
21 Roman Jakobson, “Part II: Two Aspects of Language and Two Types of Aphasic Disturbance,” in Fundamentals of Language (1st ed. 1956; 2nd rev. ed.; ed. Roman Jakobson and Moris Halle; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1975) 72. Page numbers taken from the revised edition.
22 Ibid., 75.
23 Note that Greenstein divides the couplet differently from the MT.
24 Curtis, “Job’s Response to Yahweh.”
25 Cho, “Job the Penitent,” 158–59.
26 Lester J. Kuyper (“The Repentance of Job,” VT 9 [1959] 91–94, at 94) writes, “The MT offers no object for this verb. Every translation must supply one.”
27 See, for example, Cho, “Job the Penitent,” 161–74.
28 For precedence, see Duck-Woo Nam, Talking about God: Job 42:7—9 and the Nature of God in the Book of Job (New York: Lang, 2003).
29 Ken Brown, The Vision in Job 4 and Its Role in the Book (FAT 2/75; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2015); Edward L. Greenstein, “The Extent of Job’s First Speech,” in Studies in Bible and Exegesis Vol. VI: Presented toMenachem Cohen (ed. Shmuel Vargon et al.; Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 2005) 245–62 [Hebrew].
30 David J. Clines, Job 21–37 (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2006) 905–9; idem, “ ‘The Fear of the Lord Is Wisdom’ (Job 28:28): A Semantic and Contextual Study,” in Job 28: Cognition in Context (ed. Ellen van Wolde; Leiden: Brill, 2003) 57–92, esp. 78–83.
31 Edward L. Greenstein, “Translating Job as Befits a Great Ancient Work,” ASOR 7 (2019).
32 Edward L. Greenstein, review of The Vision in Job 4 and Its Role in the Book: Reframing the Development of the Joban Dialogues, by Ken Brown, AJS Review (2018) 197–200, at 200.
33 Ibid., 198.
34 Benjamin, “Task of the Translator,” 261.