diff --git a/jobhelper.sh b/jobhelper.sh
index 5f454780f09678ff98b3ed049a357656b72a0115..f1b66b6df88aa65aef9b4bdb375ea13d845252bf 100755
--- a/jobhelper.sh
+++ b/jobhelper.sh
@@ -73,7 +73,7 @@ function j_init(){
 
   # for date definitions like weekdays
   JOBDEF_LANG=`_j_getvar ${JOBFILE} "lang"`
-  if [ -z $JOBDEF_LANG ]; then
+  if [ -z "$JOBDEF_LANG" ]; then
     JOBDEF_LANG="en_us"
   fi
   export LANG=$JOBDEF_LANG