Then Satan answered the LORD: Satan is not ready to be proved wrong. Answered does not mean that Satan is responding to a question, but rather reacting to Yahweh’s belief in Job’s faithfulness; Good News Translation “replied” is more suitable for English.

Skin for skin! All that a man has he will give for his life: with this enigmatic saying Satan throws down a new challenge, which Yahweh soon accepts. Skin for skin has the appearance of a proverbial saying, for which many interpretations have been given. (Gordis includes a discussion of these.) However, the second part of the saying is interpretive and restricts the meaning of the first part. Therefore the saying can be understood as “Skin covers a deeper (layer of) skin.” Thus Yahweh has “put a hedge” around Job and all that he has (1.10). In the first test Satan has been allowed to penetrate the hedge, perhaps the first layer of “skin.” Yahweh’s hedge still limits Satan’s attacks, and for this reason Satan challenges Yahweh to remove it. Translators will notice that Good News Translation has not retained the proverbial saying, assuming that the second part makes the point unambiguously. Some modern translations keep the literal saying and offer several explanations in a note. Others rephrase the saying; for example, Biblia Dios Habla Hoy “Unless you touch someone in his very hide, everything goes along fine”; Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch “Thus far he has not made a bad trade,” implying that he has allowed his family and wealth to be sacrificed to save his own skin, but evidence for this interpretation is weak. In some languages it will be possible to substitute another proverb for Skin for skin, but in other languages it will be better to follow the model of Good News Translation.

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 .