FOR NOTHING — gratis, without payment, for no return; from chen, 'favor,' so: as a free gift. It carries the hinge of two books. In Malachi 1:10 the priests will not kindle the altar chinnam (on one reading, 'for free, unpaid' — the KJV and Geneva take it that way; ASV and NIV read 'in vain'). In Job 1:9 the Accuser asks the question the whole book exists to answer: 'Is it for nothing (ha-chinnam) that Job fears God?' — is disinterested devotion possible, or is piety only ever a paid arrangement? → first discussed at Job 1:9