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the Week of Proper 16 / Ordinary 21
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Read the Bible

New Living Translation

Job 11:4

You claim, ‘My beliefs are pure,' and ‘I am clean in the sight of God.'

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:

- Nave's Topical Bible - Self-Righteousness;   Uncharitableness;  

Dictionaries:

- American Tract Society Bible Dictionary - Zophar;   Charles Buck Theological Dictionary - Greatness of God;   Hypocrisy;   Holman Bible Dictionary - God;   Job, the Book of;   Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible - Doctrine;   Wilson's Dictionary of Bible Types - Clean;  

Encyclopedias:

- International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Doctrine;  

Parallel Translations

Christian Standard Bible®
You have said, “My teaching is sound,and I am pure in your sight.”
Hebrew Names Version
For you say, 'My doctrine is pure, I am clean in your eyes.'
King James Version
For thou hast said, My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in thine eyes.
English Standard Version
For you say, ‘My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in God's eyes.'
New Century Version
You say, ‘My teachings are right, and I am clean in God's sight.'
New English Translation
For you have said, ‘My teaching is flawless, and I am pure in your sight.'
Amplified Bible
"For you have said, 'My teaching (doctrine) [that God knowingly afflicts the righteous] is pure, And I am innocent in your eyes.'
New American Standard Bible
"For you have said, 'My teaching is pure, And I am innocent in your eyes.'
World English Bible
For you say, 'My doctrine is pure, I am clean in your eyes.'
Geneva Bible (1587)
For thou hast sayde, My doctrine is pure, and I am cleane in thine eyes.
Legacy Standard Bible
You have said, ‘My learning is pure,And I am innocent in your eyes.'
Berean Standard Bible
You have said, 'My doctrine is sound, and I am pure in Your sight.'
Contemporary English Version
You claim to be innocent and argue that your beliefs are acceptable to God.
Complete Jewish Bible
"You claim that your teaching is pure; you tell [God], ‘I am clean in your sight.'
Darby Translation
For thou sayest, My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in thine eyes.
Easy-to-Read Version
You say to God, ‘My arguments are right, and you can see I am pure.'
George Lamsa Translation
For you say, I was led righteously, and I am pure in my sight.
Good News Translation
You claim that what you say is true; you claim you are pure in the sight of God.
Lexham English Bible
For you say, ‘My teaching is pure, and I am clean in your sight.'
Literal Translation
For you have said, My doctrine is pure; and, I am clean in Your eyes.
Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
Wilt thou saye vnto God: The thinge that I take in honde, is perfecte, & I am clene in thy sight?
American Standard Version
For thou sayest, My doctrine is pure, And I am clean in thine eyes.
Bible in Basic English
You may say, My way is clean, and I am free from sin in your eyes.
JPS Old Testament (1917)
And thou hast said: 'My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in Thine eyes.'
King James Version (1611)
For thou hast said, My doctrine is pure, and I am cleane in thine eyes.
Bishop's Bible (1568)
For thou hast sayde, my doctrine is pure, and I am cleane in thyne eyes.
Brenton's Septuagint (LXX)
For say not, I am pure in my works, and blameless before him.
English Revised Version
For thou sayest, My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in thine eyes.
Wycliffe Bible (1395)
For thou seidist, My word is cleene, and Y am cleene in thi siyt.
Update Bible Version
For you say, My doctrine is pure, And I am clean in your eyes.
Webster's Bible Translation
For thou hast said, My doctrine [is] pure, and I am clean in thy eyes.
New King James Version
For you have said, "My doctrine is pure, And I am clean in your eyes.'
New Life Bible
For you say, ‘What I believe is pure. I am without fault in Your eyes.'
New Revised Standard
For you say, ‘My conduct is pure, and I am clean in God's sight.'
J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
Since thou hast said, Right is my doctrine, and pure am I in his eyes.
Douay-Rheims Bible
For thou hast said: My word is pure, and I am clean in thy sight.
Revised Standard Version
For you say, 'My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in God's eyes.'
Young's Literal Translation
And thou sayest, `Pure [is] my discourse, And clean I have been in Thine eyes.'
New American Standard Bible (1995)
"For you have said, 'My teaching is pure, And I am innocent in your eyes.'

Contextual Overview

1 Then Zophar the Naamathite replied to Job: 2 "Shouldn't someone answer this torrent of words? Is a person proved innocent just by a lot of talking? 3 Should I remain silent while you babble on? When you mock God, shouldn't someone make you ashamed? 4 You claim, ‘My beliefs are pure,' and ‘I am clean in the sight of God.' 5 If only God would speak; if only he would tell you what he thinks! 6 If only he would tell you the secrets of wisdom, for true wisdom is not a simple matter. Listen! God is doubtless punishing you far less than you deserve!

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

For thou: Job 6:10, Job 10:7, 1 Peter 3:15

I am clean: Job 6:29, Job 6:30, Job 7:20, Job 9:2, Job 9:3, Job 14:4, Job 34:5, Job 34:6, Job 35:2

Reciprocal: Exodus 38:21 - tabernacle of testimony Job 9:14 - shall I Job 33:9 - clean

Cross-References

Genesis 6:4
In those days, and for some time after, giant Nephilites lived on the earth, for whenever the sons of God had intercourse with women, they gave birth to children who became the heroes and famous warriors of ancient times.
Genesis 11:8
In that way, the Lord scattered them all over the world, and they stopped building the city.
Genesis 11:9
That is why the city was called Babel, because that is where the Lord confused the people with different languages. In this way he scattered them all over the world.
Genesis 11:11
After the birth of Arphaxad, Shem lived another 500 years and had other sons and daughters.
Genesis 11:13
After the birth of Shelah, Arphaxad lived another 403 years and had other sons and daughters.
Deuteronomy 1:28
Where can we go? Our brothers have demoralized us with their report. They tell us, "The people of the land are taller and more powerful than we are, and their towns are large, with walls rising high into the sky! We even saw giants there—the descendants of Anak!"'
Deuteronomy 4:27
For the Lord will scatter you among the nations, where only a few of you will survive.
Deuteronomy 9:1
"Listen, O Israel! Today you are about to cross the Jordan River to take over the land belonging to nations much greater and more powerful than you. They live in cities with walls that reach to the sky!
2 Samuel 8:13
So David became even more famous when he returned from destroying 18,000 Edomites in the Valley of Salt.
Psalms 92:9
Your enemies, Lord , will surely perish; all evildoers will be scattered.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

For thou hast said,.... What follows is produced to support the charge, especially of lying, which seems to be founded on what he had said in Job 6:10;

my doctrine [is] pure; free from error, unadulterated, unmixed, not blended with Heathenish principles and human doctrines; but tending to purity of heart and life, as every word of God, and doctrine that comes from him, is pure, yea, very pure, like silver purified seven times; and such was Job's doctrine which he "received" from God, "took" y up and professed, taught and delivered to others, so far as was agreeable to the will of God, and the revelation he had then made: and it appears that Job had very clear and sublime notions of God, of his being and perfections, of his works of nature, providence, and grace; of Christ his living Redeemer, of redemption and justification by him, and of the resurrection of the dead; and had purer and better notions of divine things than his friends had, and spoke better things of God than they did, God himself being witness, Job 42:7; some interpret this of the purity of his life and conversation: he is further charged with saying:

and I am clean in thine eyes: speaking to God, as Jarchi observes; and indeed so he was, and every believer is, in an evangelic sense; as to the new man, which is created in righteousness and true holiness, is without sin, and cannot commit it; and as washed from all sin in the blood of Christ, and as clothed with his righteousness, in which the saints are faultless before the throne, and are unblamable and irreprovable in the sight of God: but Zophar's meaning is, that Job had asserted that he was entirely free from sin in himself, was wholly without it, and did not commit any; and had appealed to God, as knowing it to be true; and which he seems to have grounded on what he had said,

Job 10:7; through a mistake of his sense; which was not that he was free from sin entirely, but from any gross notorious sin, or from a wicked course of living, and particularly from the sin of hypocrisy, his friends suggested he was guilty of; otherwise he confesses himself a sinner, and prays for the pardon of his sins, and disclaims perfection in himself; see Job 7:20; and indeed there is no creature in itself clean in the sight of God, either angels or men; every man is naturally unclean; no good man is without sin, without the being, indwelling, and commission of it; nor will any truly gracious man say he is; he knows otherwise, and acknowledges it; he that says he is must be an ignorant man, or a vain and pharisaical man; yea, must not say the truth: some have suspected the first part of the words to be Job's, "and I am clean": and the other Zophar's explaining them; that is, "in thine eyes" z; in his own apprehension, as if he had a high and conceited opinion of himself.

y לקחי "doctrina aut oratio mea et sententia mente accepta", Michaelis; so Cocceius; "id quid ab aliis acceptum", Drusius. z Vid. Schultens in loc.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

My doctrine is pure - The Septuagint instead of the word “doctrine” here reads “deeds,” ἔργοις ergois; the Syriac, “thou sayest I have acted justly.” But the word used here (לקח leqach) means properly “fair speech” or “taking arguments,” that by which one is “taken” or captivated, from לקח lâqach, “to take.” Then it means doctrine, or instruction, Proverbs 1:5; Proverbs 9:9. Here it means the views which Job had expressed. Dr. Good supposes that it means “conduct,” a word which would suit the connection, but the Hebrew is not used in this sense.

And I am clean in thine eyes - In the eyes of God, or in his sight. This was a false charge. Job had never maintained that he was perfect (compare the notes at Job 9:20); he had only maintained that he was not such a sinner as his friends maintained that he was, a hypocrite, and a man eminent for guilt. His lack of absolute perfection he was ever ready to admit and mourn over.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Job 11:4. My doctrine is pure] לקחי likchi, "my assumptions." What I assume or take as right, and just, and true, are so; the precepts which I have formed, and the practice which I have founded on them, are all correct and perfect. Job had not exactly said, My doctrine and way of life are pure, and I am clean in thine eyes; but he had vindicated himself from their charges of secret sins and hypocrisy, and appealed to God for his general uprightness and sincerity: but Zophar here begs the question, in order that he may have something to say, and room to give vent to his invective.


 
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