Job 10:16

If I hold my head high,

   You stalk me like a lion,

Time and again,

   Display Your awesome power to smite me.

 

The battle Job speaks of is with pride. Any pride that man can hold is pitiful compared to the glory of God. I get the sense that Job is not filled with shame for his iniquity but filled with humility. I am not an expert on English or word definitions, but I get the feeling there is more breadth of meaning in shame or I am using the wrong word (in verse 15).

Looking back for comparison of words, I see that my rendition is built on huge differences from my sources.

For “If I hold my head high” my sources have:

Bold,

If I hold my head high,

If my head is exaulted,

For it increaseth,

It is something to be proud of,

and

various descriptors for lions.

At this point, I feel some of my sources have missed the point and I followed. I look at my cats as a reference and I see how they play with their toys from a position of superiority and project this onto the lion. The pride here is all on the lion, not an action of the mouse to be toyed with.

Ignoring the mouse, we have the lion described as “bold”, “head held high”, “with exalted head”, “proud”, “triumphant”, “you take pride in”, “it increased you”, and “it gives you pride”. I do not like trying to imply God gains negative pride in “hunting” us, so I think it simply is about the actions of a confident lion.

 

You stalk me as a triumphant lion,

   Time and again, displaying Your awesome power to smite me.

 

“Stalk” was also “hunt”, but I think the lion knows where we are and is not trying to kill us.

“Time and again” was “repeat”, “and again”, and “over again”.

“Displaying Your awesome power” was also “show wonders”, “show marvelous”, and “exploits against”.

To make it all the more unclear, my least favorite source has a different outcome that is: “Proud as a lion you stalk me, and then withdraw, pleased with yourself for what you have done to me.” This fits the cat picture as my cats seem proud they have messed with the little bug or toy or whatever little thing they have come upon. Again, I do not like the implication that God is building Himself up by torturing Job, but I can see how Job might feel that way. I prefer the alternative that the impact is on Job and not on God.

Final Answer:

You stalk me as a triumphant lion,

   Time and again, displaying Your awesome power to smite me.

 

And now I have realized I will have to read every single one of these to see what I have changed after the blog. And going forward, I will have to update the outcome each time I make a change. For someone with imperfect discipline, I am sure I will miss some along the way. As the big kid says, I need an editor, but only if this ever gets published, as it currently continues only as an exercise to teach me more about God knocking away my pride and building humility.

 

(Written 1/2, Posted 1/9, Job 224)