inclusive vs. exclusive pronoun (Job 15:9)

Many languages distinguish between inclusive and exclusive first-person plural pronouns (“we”). (Click or tap here to see more details)

The inclusive “we” specifically includes the addressee (“you and I and possibly others”), while the exclusive “we” specifically excludes the addressee (“he/she/they and I, but not you”). This grammatical distinction is called “clusivity.” While Semitic languages such as Hebrew or most Indo-European languages such as Greek or English do not make that distinction, translators of languages with that distinction have to make a choice every time they encounter “we” or a form thereof (in English: “we,” “our,” or “us”).

For this verse, the Jarai and the Adamawa Fulfulde translation both use the exclusive pronoun, excluding Job.

complete verse (Job 15:9)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Job 15:9:

  • Kupsabiny: “What do you know that we do not know?
    What do you know that we do not understand?” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “What do you know that we are not able to understand?
    What insights do you have that we do not have?” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “What do- you (sing.) -know that we (excl.) do- not -know also? What do- you (sing.) -understand that we (excl.) do- not -understand also?” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)

Translation commentary on Job 15:9

What do you know that we do not know?: the two lines of verse 9 are parallel without any effort at raising the intensity, and Good News Translation reduces them to one. Line a echoes Job’s claim in 12.3b and 13.2a, where he said “I am not inferior to you” and “what you know I also know.” Neither Job nor his friends are winning this argument.

What do you understand that is not clear to us?: Hebrew does not say clear to us but “with us,” which some scholars take to mean that a person possesses a thing through knowledge of it. Translators must decide on the basis of style whether to translate verse 9 as questions or statements. As a statement verse 9 may be expressed, for example, “You know nothing that we don’t also know, and all that you understand is also clear to us.”

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 .