complete verse (Job 5:25)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Job 5:25:

  • Kupsabiny: “You shall then see that your children become many,
    until they envelope/fill up a big land.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “You will have many children,
    your descendants will be as many as the grass.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “Your (sing.) descendants will-increase-in-number as many as the grass on the ground.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)

Translation commentary on Job 5:25

Your descendants shall be many: verse 25 begins by repeating the assurance given in verse 24, You shall know. Most translations do not repeat this mechanically. Your descendants translates “your seed” and is parallel to your offspring in the next line. In Genesis 3.15 “seed” refers to human offspring, and it has that meaning here.

Offspring as the grass of the earth: offspring translates a word used in Isaiah 34.1; 42.5 referring to the natural produce of the land. It is used in Job 31.8 in the same sense. Eliphaz may be foreseeing Job’s future or may have forgotten that Job’s children are all dead. Grass of the earth: this simile is used to give a picture of numerous offspring (see Good News Translation “blades of grass”). The parallelism between many in line a and grass serves to step up the poetic intensity through this figurative expression. For those who are translating Job as poetry, the two lines may be rendered, for example, “You will also have many children; they will be like grass growing everywhere.”

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 .