Job 38 · Clearspring

The LORD Challenges Job

¹Then Yahweh answered Job out of the whirlwind,+ ²“Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge?+ ³Brace yourself like a man, for I will question you, then you answer me!+ ⁴“Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Declare, if you have understanding.+ ⁵Who determined its measures, if you know? Or who stretched the line on it?+ ⁶Whereupon were its foundations fastened? Or who laid its cornerstone,+ ⁷when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?+ ⁸“Or who shut up the sea with doors, when it broke out of the womb,+ ⁹when I made clouds its garment, and wrapped it in thick darkness,+ ¹⁰marked out for it my bound, set bars and doors,+ ¹¹and said, ‘Here you may come, but no further. Here your proud waves shall be stayed?’+ ¹²“Have you commanded the morning in your days, and caused the dawn to know its place;+ ¹³that it might take hold of the ends of the earth, and shake the wicked out of it?+ ¹⁴It is changed as clay under the seal, and presented as a garment.+ ¹⁵From the wicked, their light is withheld. The high arm is broken.+ ¹⁶“Have you entered into the springs of the sea? Or have you walked in the recesses of the deep?+ ¹⁷Have the gates of death been revealed to you? Or have you seen the gates of the shadow of death?+ ¹⁸Have you comprehended the earth in its width? Declare, if you know it all.+ ¹⁹“What is the way to the dwelling of light? As for darkness, where is its place,+ ²⁰that you should take it to its bound, that you should discern the paths to its house?+ ²¹Surely you know, for you were born then, and the number of your days is great!+ ²²Have you entered the treasuries of the snow, or have you seen the treasures of the hail,+ ²³which I have reserved against the time of trouble, against the day of battle and war?+ ²⁴By what way is the lightning distributed, or the east wind scattered on the earth?+ ²⁵Who has cut a channel for the flood water, or the path for the thunderstorm;+ ²⁶To cause it to rain on a land where no man is; on the wilderness, in which there is no man;+ ²⁷to satisfy the waste and desolate ground, to cause the tender grass to grow?+ ²⁸Does the rain have a father? Or who fathers the drops of dew?+ ²⁹Out of whose womb came the ice? The gray frost of the sky, who has given birth to it?+ ³⁰The waters become hard like stone, when the surface of the deep is frozen.+ ³¹“Can you bind the cluster of the Pleiades, or loosen the cords of Orion?+ ³²Can you lead the constellations out in their season? Or can you guide the Bear with her cubs?+ ³³Do you know the laws of the heavens? Can you establish its dominion over the earth?+ ³⁴“Can you lift up your voice to the clouds, That abundance of waters may cover you?+ ³⁵Can you send out lightnings, that they may go? Do they report to you, ‘Here we are?’+ ³⁶Who has put wisdom in the inward parts? Or who has given understanding to the mind?+ ³⁷Who can count the clouds by wisdom? Or who can pour out the bottles of the sky,+ ³⁸when the dust runs into a mass, and the clods of earth stick together? ³⁹“Can you hunt the prey for the lioness, or satisfy the appetite of the young lions,+ ⁴⁰when they crouch in their dens, and lie in wait in the thicket?+ ⁴¹Who provides for the raven his prey, when his young ones cry to God, and wander for lack of food?+

The LORD Challenges Job

Study Job 38