Some scholars omit verse 28 on the basis that only here is the Hebrew ʾadonai “LORD” to be found in Job, or that this verse is inconsistent with the rest of the chapter. Neither of these reasons is convincing. The Book of Job contains many words that are used only once. From chapter 1 Job is described as a man who “fears God and turns away from evil.” Therefore verse 28 is consistent with God’s view of Job from the beginning of the poem.
And he said to man: this line is in prose. Man translates the Hebrew ʾadam, which refers to mankind and is translated as a plural in Good News Translation. It is the equivalent of “God said to human beings, or to humanity, to all people, to mankind.”
Behold, the fear of the LORD, that is wisdom: for comments on Behold see 4.18; 13.15. Fear of the LORD and depart from evil are parallel expressions found in a similar form in 1.1, 8; 2.3; Proverbs 3.7; 14.16; 16.16. Fear of the LORD, which means “honor, respect, worship of the LORD,” is the same as being wise or having wisdom. In other words “respect for the LORD is wisdom” or “a person who worships the LORD is wise.”
Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation follow the English tradition in which the name of God, Yahweh, is translated and written “LORD,” using all capital letters, and the Hebrew title ʾadonai is written “LORD.” It is ʾadonai that occurs in this verse. Normally the reader will be accustomed to the term which translates LORD in the New Testament, or in other parts of the Old Testament such as the Psalms. For a discussion of the translation of LORD, see “Translating the Book of Job,” page 21. Because the term ʾadonai occurs only once in Job, and because the reference is clearly to God, the translator may prefer to translate it as “God.”
And to depart from evil is understanding: depart from evil means “turn away from all that is bad,” “avoid doing evil things.” Most translators will want to keep a degree of parallelism between the two lines, so that if in line a “To be wise is” is used, then in line b it will be appropriate to say “to be intelligent is….” For further comments see 1.1 and 1.8. This line may also be expressed, for example, “and separating yourself from evil ways is acting intelligently,” “and avoiding bad conduct is the same as being intelligent,” “intelligence is the same as staying away from evil ways,” or “intelligence is avoiding doing evil things.”
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 .