To whom alone the land was given, And no stranger passed among them.
Parallel translations
- WEB to whom alone the land was given, and no stranger passed among them):
- KJV Unto whom alone the earth was given, and no stranger passed among them.
- BSB to whom alone the land was given when no foreigner passed among them.
- NKJV To whom alone the land was given, And no alien passed among them:
- NLT from those to whom the land was given long before any foreigners arrived.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Eliphaz claims this wisdom came from a pure, undiluted line untouched by outsiders. He presents it as uncorrupted ancestral truth.
Overview
He asserts that the sages he cites held the land alone, with no foreign influence corrupting their insight, lending their teaching a supposed purity. This appeal to untainted tradition strengthens his rhetorical authority. The irony is that this carefully guarded wisdom still fails to explain the suffering of a genuinely righteous man like Job.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 4
- Joel 3:17“So you will know that I am Yahweh, your God, dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain. Then Jerusalem will be holy, and no strangers will pass through her any more.
- Deut 32:8When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the children of men, he set the bounds of the peoples according to the number of the children of Israel.
- Gen 10:25To Eber were born two sons. The name of the one was Peleg, for in his days the earth was divided. His brother’s name was Joktan.
- Gen 10:32These are the families of the sons of Noah, by their generations, according to their nations. The nations divided from these in the earth after the flood.
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Christ at the center
Job's cry for a mediator who can lay his hand on both God and man, and his confidence that 'my Redeemer lives' and will stand on the earth, reaches forward to Jesus the living Redeemer.
How Job 15:19 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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