These two verses describe God in his dealings with human rulers and the poor.

Who says to a king, ‘Worthless one’: who says is literally “one says,” and most adjust the vowels, as in the ancient versions, to make God the subject of says. Even Hebrew Old Testament Text Project prefers the change as followed by Revised Standard Version, which has no footnote. Revised Standard Version makes verses 18 and 19 questions which begin with the relative who in the first line of each verse. The result is an awkward construction in English. Many translators prefer to translate these two verses as statements, and this is recommended. Worthless one translates a term of abuse found, for example, in 1 Samuel 25.25; 1 Kings 21.10. For a subject to address a king in this way was punishable by death (see 2 Sam 16.7, 9; 1 Kgs 2.8). The Hebrew term is a compound word which means “having no value” or “good-for-nothing.”

And to nobles, ‘Wicked man’: the thought in this line moves from the greater authority of kings to the lesser authority of nobles. These persons were referred to in 21.28 as “princes.” The equivalent in many languages is “chief” and “elders,” or “headman” and “old men.” Wicked man or “evil person” is singular in Hebrew because it matches Worthless one in the preceding line. In translation it will most often have to agree with nobles, which is plural. Many translations treat these abuse words as quotations, as in Revised Standard Version. Good News Translation treats them as part of a subordinate clause, “when they are worthless and wicked,” and thereby loses much of the emotive impact in English.

Verse 19 is a second relative clause describing God’s impartiality. Who shows no partiality to princes translates “does not lift up the face of princes.” See 13.18 for discussion of this expression. The word translated princes is used in 3.15 and 29.9. These are high-ranking officials, not necessarily sons of a king. Shows … partiality means “to take the side of,” “be unfairly in favor of,” or “to like one more than the other.”

Nor regards the rich more than the poor: the form of the parallelism is the reverse of the typical kind of poetic heightening, in that the metaphor occurs in line a and the common term in line b. Regards the rich, as in line a, means “favor the rich,” “give the rich better treatment.” The word translated rich is rare, but it occurs in parallel with “nobles” in Isaiah 32.5, and here with princes, and in contrast with the poor.

For they are all the work of his hands is the reason why God treats them all alike. In Revised Standard Version this line is taken as part of the question which began in verse 17. Good News Translation avoids the awkwardness of such a long question by making statements in verses 18 and 19. Verse 19 may also be rendered idiomatically in some languages; for example, “God does not share the seat of chiefs, and he does not treat the rich better than the poor, because he is the one who made them all” or “God does not sit down among the leaders, and he treats the rich and the poor alike, because he is their creator.”

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 .