Should I continue to wait, now that you are silent? Must I also remain silent?
Parallel translations
- WEB Shall I wait, because they don’t speak, because they stand still, and answer no more?
- KJV When I had waited, (for they spake not, but stood still, and answered no more;)
- BSB Must I wait, now that they are silent, now that they stand and no longer reply?
- NKJV And I have waited, because they did not speak, Because they stood still and answered no more.
- NASB “Should I wait, because they are not speaking, Because they have stopped and no longer answer?
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
The tablets and their writing were the direct work of God. This stresses the divine origin and authority of the law.
Overview
The text emphasizes that both the stone and the engraving came from God Himself, underscoring the law's holiness. This divine authorship gives the Ten Commandments their enduring authority. It also magnifies Israel's guilt, for they have spurned words written by the very hand of God.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 4
- Job 13:5Oh that you would be completely silent! Then you would be wise.
- Prov 17:28Even a fool, when he keeps silent, is counted wise. When he shuts his lips, he is thought to be discerning.
- Jas 1:19So, then, my beloved brothers, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger;
- Amos 5:13Therefore a prudent person keeps silent in such a time, for it is an evil time.
Resources, by level
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
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 32:16 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
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.