inclusive vs. exclusive pronoun (Job 8:9)

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 inclusive pronoun, including everyone.

complete verse (Job 8:9)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Job 8:9:

  • Kupsabiny: “The life(span) of the current generation is short and they do not know much.
    We are all like a fog that thickens and in a little while, it is over/gone.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “For we were just born yesterday, and we don’t know anything.
    Our life on earth is only like a shadow.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “For (It is) as-if we (incl.) were just born and only little (is) what we (incl.) knew/know, and we (incl.) are just passing-by on the earth like a shadow that does- not -last-long.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “It seems as though we were born only yesterday
    and we know very little ;
    our time here on the earth disappears quickly, like a shadow.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

Translation commentary on Job 8:9

The two lines of verse 9 are parallel and stress the need to make use of the experience of the past because of the limited knowledge and life of the living generation. For we are but of yesterday: in 14.1-2 Job observes that a person’s life “is of few days,” which he compares to a flower that blooms and withers. By contrast the fathers, men like Enoch and Noah, lived long lives and gained vast experience. The sense of this expression is as in Good News Translation, “Life is short.” Translators should seek to use equivalent sayings that express the shortness of life. In some languages it is necessary to express life as a verb; for example, “We live only a short while,” “We do not live long,” or “We live very few years and then die.” And know nothing is understood to be in contrast with the great knowledge accumulated in past ages. Our days on earth are a shadow: shadow is used in Old Testament poetry as a symbol of the briefness of life; for example, Psalm 144.4, “Man is like a breath, his days are like a passing shadow.” The same thought is expressed in 1 Chronicles 29.15. In translation it may be necessary to shift to a simile and to complete the comparison; for example, “The time we live on earth passes the way a shadow passes” or “… goes away as a shadow disappears.”

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 .