here to Job can hardly count as any “answer” to them, it is clear that he has the friends in view (similarly Rowley), even if they do not appear on the surface of the text until now. When Job speaks, judges Elihu, it is nothing but windy emptiness (הבל), Qoheleth’s term for aimless vanity, without worth or substance. Talk without knowledge (בלי־דעת) is anathema to Elihu, since he is so committed to rationality and sound learning. The wicked, he will shortly affirm, come to the grimmest of ends