Job 37:11 Komentář

Elihu here goes on to extol the wonderful power of God in the meteors and all the changes of the weather: if, in those changes, we submit to the will of God, take the weather as it is and make the best of it, why should we not do so in other changes of our condition? Here he observes the hand of God, I. In the thunder and lightning (Job 37:1-5). II. In the frost and snow, the rains and wind (Job 37:6-13). III. He applies it to Job, and challenges him to solve the phenomena of these works of nature, that confessing his ignorance in them, he might own himself an incompetent judge in the proceedings of divine Providence, (Job 37:14-22). And then, IV. Concludes with his principle, which he undertook to make out, That God is great and greatly to be feared (Job 37:23, Job 37:24).

INTRODUCTION TO JOB 37 Elihu in this chapter proceeds to show the greatness of God as it appears in other of his works of nature, which greatly affected him, and to an attention to which he exhorts others, Job 37:1; particularly thunder and lightning, the direction, extent, and order of which he observes, Job 37:3; and then suggests that besides these there are other great things done by him, incomprehensible and unknown in various respects; as the snow, and rain, lesser and greater, which come on the earth at his command, and have such effect on men as to seal up their hands, and on the beasts of the field as to cause them to retire to their dens, and there remain, Job 37:5; and then he goes on to take notice of wind, and frost, and the clouds, and dispersion of them; their use and ends, whether in judgment or mercy, Job 37:9; and then calls on Job to consider these wondrous works of God, and remark how ignorant men are of the disposition of clouds for the rainbow; of the balancing of them; of the heat and quietness that come by the south wind, and of the firmness of the sky, Job 37:14; and from all this he concludes the terrible majesty, unsearchable nature of God, the excellency of his power and justice; and that men therefore should and do fear him, who is no respecter of persons, Job 37:21.

Also by watering he wearieth the thick cloud,.... By filling it with a multitude of water, it is as it were loaded and made weary with it; and especially by sending it about thus loaded from place to place before discharged, when it becomes as a weary traveller; and then by letting down the water in it, whereby it spends itself like one that is weary; an emblem of ministers that spend and are spent for the good of men: some render it by serenity or fair weather, and so Mr. Broughton, "by clearness he wearieth the thick vapours;'' by causing a clear sky he dispels them; he scattereth his bright cloud; thin light clouds that have nothing in them, and are soon dispersed and come to nothing, and are seen no more; all emblem of such as are clouds without water, Jde 1:12; see Zac 11:17; or "he scatters the cloud by his light" (s); by the sun, which dispels clouds and makes a clear sky; an emblem of the blotting out and forgiveness of sins, and of restoring the manifestations of divine love, and the joys of salvation; see Isa 44:22. (s) "dispellit nubem luce sua", Munster.

The corn desireth clouds. And the clouds scatter their light. For what are all the Elect, but the corn of God, to be treasured up in the heavenly garners? Which now bear with the chaff in the threshing of the floor; because in this purification of Holy Church, they endure the contrary habits of the reprobate, till the inward Husbandman separates them with His fan of judgment, and taking His Elect, as grains now cleaned, into the heavenly habitations, consigns the chaff to eternal fires. Whence it is well said by John, Whose fan is in His hand, and He will throughly purge His floor, and will gather the wheat into His barn, but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire. [Matt. 3, 12] But this corn, till it attain to the perfection of its fruits, looks for the rains of the clouds, in order to its growth. Because the mind of good men is watered with the words of preachers, lest it should be drained of the moisture of charity by the sun of carnal desires. The heavenly Husbandman had beheld this corn growing up in the world, and desiring the clouds, when He was saying, The harvest indeed is plenteous, but the labourers are few. But pray ye the Lord of the harvest, to send forth labourers into His harvest. [Matt. 9, 37. 38.] Those therefore which here are called 'corn,' are there called 'harvest,' but they who are here called 'clouds,' are there called 'labourers,' because holy preachers are both clouds and labourers; clouds, namely, by their doctrine, labourers by their life; clouds because they flow into us by their words, labourers, because they cease not to do what they speak. For, for clouds to scatter their light, is for holy preachers to spread abroad examples of conduct, both by their words and actions. But though they scatter the light of their inward message, yet they do not attain to the conversion of all the hearts which they desire.

He relates these effects to the usefulness for men saying, "The clouds desire grain," as if to say: The clouds are ordered to grain as an end for which they are useful. Each thing desires its own proper end, and accordingly he says the clouds desire grain, because clouds are certainly useful for grain. Or, the reason the rains descend from a cloud and water the earth is to make it fertile for the production of grain. Or it is also useful for clouds to cover grain and shade it sometimes so that the grain does not dry out from the unremitting heat of the sun. He adds another useful feature of the clouds when he says, "and the clouds pour out their light," which can refer either to the light of lightning flashing according to what he already said in the preceding chapter, "If he wills to extend the clouds or to make flash with his light." (36:29) Or this can more refer to the light which shines in the air from the sun's rays reflected off the clouds and mixed with them in some way. So the brightness of the sun appears in the air before the rising of the sun and also after its setting because of the reflection of the rays of the sun from the clouds which are in a higher place, which the solar rays reach more quickly and leave more slowly.

Elihu continues to set forth the wisdom and omnipotence of God, as manifested in the thunder and lightning, Job 37:1-5; in the snows and frosts, Job 37:6-8; in various meteors; and shows the end for which they are sent, Job 37:9-13. Job is exhorted to consider the wondrous works of God in the light, in the clouds, in the winds, in heat and cold, in the formation of the heavens, and in the changes of the atmosphere, Job 37:14-22. The perfections of God, and how he should be reverenced by his creatures, Job 37:23, Job 37:24.

By watering he wearieth the thick cloud - Perhaps it would be better to say, The brightness ברי beri, dissipates the cloud; or, if we follow our version, By watering the earth he wearieth, wearieth out or emptieth, the thick cloud - causes it to pour down all its contents upon the earth, that they may cause it to bring forth and bud. The Vulgate understood it differently: Frumentum desiderat nubes, et nubes spargunt lumen suum. "The grain desireth the clouds; and the clouds scatter abroad their light."

(Job 37:1-24) At this--when I hear the thundering of the Divine Majesty. Perhaps the storm already had begun, out of which God was to address Job (Job 38:1).

How the thunderclouds are dispersed, or else employed by God, either for correction or mercy. by watering--by loading it with water. wearieth--burdeneth it, so that it falls in rain; thus "wearieth" answers to the parallel "scattereth" (compare, see on Job 37:9); a clear sky resulting alike from both. bright cloud--literally, "cloud of his light," that is, of His lightning. UMBREIT for "watering," &c., translates; "Brightness drives away the clouds, His light scattereth the thick clouds"; the parallelism is thus good, but the Hebrew hardly sanctions it.

11 Also He loadeth the clouds with water, He spreadeth far and wide the cloud of His light, 12 And these turn themselves round about, Directed by Him, that they execute All that He hath commanded them Over the wide earth. 13 Whether for a scourge, or for the good of His earth, Or for mercy, He causeth it to discharge itself. With אף extending the description, Elihu, in the presence of the storm that is in the sky, continually returns to this one marvel of nature. The old versions connect בּרי partly with בּר, electus (lxx, Syr., Theod.) or frumentum (Symm., Jer.), partly with בּרה = בּרר in the signification puritas, serenitas (Targ.); but בּרי is, as Schultens has already perceived, the Hebr.-Arabic רי, Arab. rı̂yun, rı̂j-un (from רוה = riwj), abundant irrigation, with בּ; and יטריח does not signify, according to the Arab. atraha, "to hurl down," so that what is spoken of would be the bursting of the clouds (Stick.), (Note: This "atraha" is, moreover, a pure invention of our ordinary Arabic lexicons instead of ittaraha (VIII form): (1) to throw one's self, (2) to throw anything from one's self, with an acc. of the thing. - Fl.) but, according to טרח, a burden (comp. Arab. taraha ala, to load), "to burden;" with fluidity (Ew., Hirz., Hahn, Schlottm.), better: fulness of water, He burdens the clouds (comp. rawij-un as a designation of cloud as the place of rain). ענן אורו, His cloud of light, is that that is charged with lightning, and הפיץ has here its Hebr.-Arab. radical signification effundere, diffundere, with a preponderance of the idea not of scattering, but of spreading out wide (Arab. faid, abundance). והוּא, Job 37:12, refers to the cloud pregnant with lightning; this turns round about (מסבּות, adv. as מסב, round about, Kg1 6:29) seeking a place, where it shall unburden itself by virtue of His (God's) direction or disposing (תחבּוּלת, a word belonging to the book of Proverbs; lxx, Cod. Vat. and Alex., untranslated: εν θεεβουλαθωθ, Cod. Sinait. still more monstrous), in order that they (the clouds full of lightning) may accomplish everything that He commands them over the surface of the earth; ארצה as Job 34:13, and the combination תּבל ארצה as Pro 8:31, comp. ארץ ותבל, Psa 90:2. The reference of the pronominal suff. to men is as inadmissible here as in Job 37:4. In Job 37:13 two אם have certainly, as Job 34:29, two ו, the correlative signification sive ... sive (Arab. in ... wa-in), in a third, as appears, a conditional, but which? According to Ew., Hirz., Hahn, Schlottm., and others, the middle one: if it (the rod) belongs to His land, i.e., if it has deserved it. But even the possessive suff. of לארצו shows that the ל is to be taken as dat. commodi: be it for a rod, be it for the good of His land; which is then followed by a conditional verbal clause: in case He mercifully causes it (the storm) to come, i.e., causes this His land to be overtaken by it (המציא here with the acc., the thing coming, whereas in Job 34:11 of the thing to be overtaken). The accentuation, indeed, appears to assume a threefold sive: whether He causeth it to discharge itself upon man for punishment, man for mercy, or His earth for good with reference to man. Then Elihu would think of the uninhabited steppe in connection with אם לארצו. Since a conditional אם by the side of two correlatives is hazardous, we decide finally with the lxx, Targ., and all the old versions, in favour of the same rendering of the threefold אם, especially since it corresponds to the circumstances of the case.