Having concentrated on the remoteness of the mines, the poet now speaks of the work of miners whose great feats enable them to extract precious stones. Man puts his hand to the flinty rock: this line is patterned after verse 3a. The subject man is impersonal. Puts his hand is used as in Genesis 37.22, in which Reuben advises his brothers not to harm Joseph. The expression carries the thought of “attack.” What someone attacks here is the flinty rock, which some render as “the granite rock.” The term meaning “flint stone” is used to indicate a hard rock that resists the efforts of the miners. Good News Translation emphasizes the hardness of the rock rather than its mineral nature, with “Men dig the hardest rocks.” This line may also be rendered “Miners attack the hardest rocks to remove their ore” or “They dig into solid granite.”

And overturns mountains by the roots: overturns translates the same verb root used in verse 5, where it is rendered “turned up.” It is used of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 19.21-29. The word translated roots is the same as for the “roots” of trees and is used to express the extent of the excavation of the mountain. Good News Translation calls it “their base.” Biblia Dios Habla Hoy says “and pulls up the roots of the mountains.” The picture given is somewhat exaggerated, but if the receptor language permits this kind of figurative expression, the translator should use it; for example, “they turn mountains upside down,” “they pull up mountains by their roots (feet),” or more subdued, “they dig into the very bottoms of the mountains.”

Quoted with permission from Reyburn, Wiliam. A Handbook on Job. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1992. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .