I will take my flesh in my teeth: in Hebrew verse 14 begins with “Why” as if a question is being asked. However, “Why” spoils the sense, and most scholars understand it to be a copyist’s repetition of the last word in verse 13. So they omit it and express the line as a statement, as in Revised Standard Version, Good News Translation. Flesh in this line can best be equated with life in the next line. This parallelism is the reverse of the more common occurrence of the figurative element in the second line. My flesh and my life refer to Job’s life. Together the two lines say “I will risk my life.” See Judges 12.3; 1 Samuel 19.5 for the same expression. Various explanations have been given for the saying in line a. However, many of these can be dismissed because line b makes clear that Job is ready to risk his life. Consequently line a must also mean that he is ready to risk his life, called flesh. If it is possible to retain the parallelism by using two expressions meaning “I am willing to risk my life,” this is recommended. However, it is also possible to follow the model of Good News Translation. Line a may also be rendered, for example, “I am willing to risk my life” or “I am ready to put my life on the line.”

And put my life in my hand: since the meaning of this line is about the same in sense as the figure used in line a, Good News Translation reduces the two lines to one. Biblia Dios Habla Hoy translates the verse “I will risk my life; I will bet everything for everything.” Bible en français courant says “Here I am ready for it all, even to risk my life.”

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 .