Look at the heavens, and see; and behold the clouds, which are higher than you: Zophar in 11.7, 8 and Eliphaz in 22.12 have both responded to Job by comparing God’s wisdom to the heavens. Even Job has done the same in 9.8-9. The poetic movement in this line is from the more remote heavens in the first line down to the closer and more specific clouds in the second line, which is one of the devices in parallelism for fine tuning or focusing. The suggestion is that God, symbolized as heavens and clouds, is above and beyond the reach of human beings. This verse serves only to introduce verse 6. Line a has two verbs for see, which reflect Elihu’s emphatic kind of command. There is little point in attempting to translate with two different verbs for seeing; the meaning is “Look up at the sky!” Behold translates a verb meaning “to perceive, consider, view carefully,” and so New Jerusalem Bible translates “observe how high the clouds are above you.”

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 .