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New Living Translation
Job 31:38
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- InternationalParallel Translations
If my land cries out against meand its furrows join in weeping,
If my land cries out against me, And the furrows of it weep together;
If my land cry against me, or that the furrows likewise thereof complain;
"If my land has cried out against me and its furrows have wept together,
"If my land cries out against me and its plowed rows are not wet with tears,
"If my land cried out against me and all its furrows wept together,
"For if my land has cried out against me, And its furrows weep together;
"If my land cries out against me, And its furrows weep together;
If my land cries out against me, And the furrows of it weep together;
If my lande cry against me, or the furrowes thereof complayne together,
"If my land cries out against me,And its furrows weep together,
If my land cries out against me and its furrows weep together,
I have never mistreated the land I farmed and made it mourn.
"If my land cried out against me, if its furrows wept together,
If my land cry out against me, and its furrows weep together;
"I did not use my land in a wrong way. I never caused it to suffer.
Let the earth lament over me, let its furrows weep together,
If I have stolen the land I farm and taken it from its rightful owners—
If my land has cried out against me, and its furrows have wept together,
If my land cries out against me, or its furrows weep together;
But yf case be that my londe crie agaynst me, or yt the forowes therof make eny complaynte:
If my land crieth out against me, And the furrows thereof weep together;
If my land has made an outcry against me, or the ploughed earth has been in sorrow;
If my land cry out against me, and the furrows thereof weep together;
If my land cry against me, or that the furrowes likewise thereof complaine:
But if case be that my lande crye against me, or that the forowes thereof make any complaynt:
If at any time the land groaned against me, and if its furrows mourned together;
If my land cry out against me, and the furrows thereof weep together;
If my lond crieth ayens me, and hise forewis wepen with it;
If my land cries out against me, And the furrows thereof weep together;
If my land crieth against me, or its furrows likewise complain;
"If my land cries out against me, And its furrows weep together;
"If my land cries out against me and the ditches made by the plow cry together,
"If my land has cried out against me, and its furrows have wept together;
If, against me, my ground used to cry out, and, together, my ridges did weep;
If my land cry against me, and with it the furrows thereof mourn:
"If my land has cried out against me, and its furrows have wept together;
If against me my land doth cry out, And together its furrows weep,
"If the very ground that I farm accuses me, if even the furrows fill with tears from my abuse, If I've ever raped the earth for my own profit or dispossessed its rightful owners, Then curse it with thistles instead of wheat, curse it with weeds instead of barley." The words of Job to his three friends were finished.
"If my land cries out against me, And its furrows weep together;
Contextual Overview
Bible Verse Review
from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge
cry: Job 20:27, Habakkuk 2:11, James 5:4
complain: Heb. weep, Psalms 65:13
Reciprocal: Genesis 4:10 - crieth Genesis 4:11 - opened Genesis 44:9 - both Exodus 22:23 - they cry at all Deuteronomy 24:15 - lest he Joshua 22:22 - if it be Nehemiah 5:1 - a great cry Job 18:15 - because Job 20:19 - Because Psalms 7:5 - Let Isaiah 5:7 - a cry Micah 2:2 - they covet Acts 25:11 - if I
Cross-References
"Please listen to me," Laban replied. "I have become wealthy, for the Lord has blessed me because of you.
You had little indeed before I came, but your wealth has increased enormously. The Lord has blessed you through everything I've done. But now, what about me? When can I start providing for my own family?"
And Jacob began to notice a change in Laban's attitude toward him.
So Jacob called Rachel and Leah out to the field where he was watching his flock.
There will be no miscarriages or infertility in your land, and I will give you long, full lives.
Your children and your crops will be blessed. The offspring of your herds and flocks will be blessed.
Gill's Notes on the Bible
If my land cry against me,.... Some think that this verse and
Job 31:39 stand out of their place, and should rather follow after
Job 31:34; and some place them after Job 31:25; and others after
Job 31:8; but this is the order of them in all copies and versions, as they stand in our Bibles; and here, after Job had expressed his desire to have a hearer and judge of his cause, and his charge exhibited in writing, and his confidence of the issue of it, should it be granted, returns to his former subject, to clear himself from any notorious vice he was suspected of or charged with; and as he had gone through what might respect him in private life, here he gives another instance in public life, with which he concludes; namely, purging himself from tyranny and oppression, with which his friends had charged him without any proof; and he denies that the land he lived on was possessed of, and of which he was the proprietor, cried against him as being unjustly gotten, either by fraud or by force, from others; or as being ill used by him either as being too much cultivated, having never any rest, or lying fallow; and so much weakened and drained of its strength, or neglected and overrun with weeds, thorns, and thistles; or on account of the dressers and tillers of it being badly dealt with, either overworked, or not having sufficiency of food, or their wages, detained from them; all which are crying sins, and by reason of which the land by a figure may be said to cry out as the stone out of the wall, and the beam out of the timber, because of the sins of spoil, violence, oppression, and covetousness, Habakkuk 2:11;
or that the furrows likewise thereof complain; or "weep" a, on account of the like ill usage. Jarchi, and so the Midrash, interpret this of not allowing the forgotten sheaf and corner of the field to the poor, and detaining the tithes; and of ploughing and making furrows with an ox and an ass together; but the laws respecting these things were not yet in being; and if they had been, were only binding on Israelites, and not on Job, and the men of his country.
a יבכיון "defleant", Pagninus, Montanus; "flent", Beza, Piscator, Cocceius, &c.
Barnes' Notes on the Bible
If my land cry against me - This is a new specification of an offence, and an imprecation of an appropriate punishment if he had been guilty of it. Many have supposed that these closing verses have been transferred from their appropriate place by an error of transcribers, and that they should have been inserted between Job 31:23-24 - or in some previous part of the chapter. It is certain that Job 31:35-37 would make an appropriate and impressive close of the chapter, being a solemn appeal to God in reference to all the specifications, or to the general tenor of his life; but there is no authority from the MSS. to make any change in the present arrangement. All the ancient versions insert the verses in the place which they now occupy, and in this all versions agree, except, according to Kennicott, the Teutonic version, where they are inserted after Job 31:25. All the MSS. also concur in the present arrangement.
Schultens supposes that there is manifest pertinency and propriety in the present arrangement. The former specification, says he, related mainly to his private life, this to his more public conduct; and the design is to vindicate himself from the charge of injustice and crime in both respects, closing appropriately with the latter. Rosenmuller remarks that in a composition composed in an age and country so remote as this, we are not to look for or demand the observance of the same regularity which is required by the modern canons of criticism. At all events, there is no authority for changing the present arrangement of the text. The meaning of the phrase “if my land cry out against me” is, that in the cultivation of his land he had not been guilty of injustice. He had not employed those to till it who had been compelled to do it, nor had he imposed on them unreasonable burdens, nor had he defrauded them of their wages. The land had not had occasion to cry out against him to God, because fraud or injustice had been done to any in its cultivation; compare Genesis 4:10; Hab. ii. 11.
Or that the furrows likewise thereof complain - Margin, weep. The Hebrew is, “If the furrows weep together,” or “in like manner weep.” This is a beautiful image. The very furrows in the field are personified as weeping on account of injustice which would be done them, and of the burdens which would be laid on them, if they were compelled to contribute to oppression and fraud.
Clarke's Notes on the Bible
Verse Job 31:38. If my land cry — The most careless reader may see that the introduction of this and the two following verses here, disturbs the connection, and that they are most evidently out of their place. Job seems here to refer to that law, Leviticus 25:1-7, by which the Israelites were obliged to give the land rest every seventh year, that the soil might not be too much exhausted by perpetual cultivation, especially in a country which afforded so few advantages to improve the arable ground by manure. He, conscious that he had acted according to this law, states that his land could not cry out against him, nor its furrows complain. He had not broken the law, nor exhausted the soil.
