No doubt you are the people: No doubt translates a word meaning “truly,” which, when followed as it is by the Hebrew conjunction ki, has the meaning “It is true that, doubtless, certainly.” The word translated people has no article in the Hebrew, as it normally would have to give the Revised Standard Version meaning. However, in poetry articles are not always found as they are in prose, and so the Revised Standard Version meaning can still be obtained. Many different changes to the text have been proposed by scholars, but none are convincing. Job is saying in a sarcastic way “You are the important people, the ones who count, the people everyone listens to.” Good News Translation “the voice of the people” means “You are the ones who speak for the people.” In some languages this expression is rendered, for example, “You are the mouths of the village,” “Out of your mouths the people speak,” or “Your tongues speak for everyone.”

And wisdom will die with you: this line is not parallel with the first line but is a separate thought in the form of a relative clause describing the people in that line. “you are the people with whom wisdom will die out” or “after you die there will be no more wise people alive.”

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 .