The Pulpit Commentary — Job — Section 418

Ruler, tracing hie governmental power and authority through every department of creation. 1. In the realm of shadt111, (Vel'II. 15, 6.) Bildad had said that God's dominion pervaded "the heights," or heavenly plaoee (oh. :u:v. 2). Job adds that it also extends to the dark underworld of depart.oo. spirits; oonceming which me.y be noted: (1) 1.'ho names given to this mysterious region-Sheol and Abaddon; the first a subterranean abode, full of Tartarean darkness (eh. L 21, 22), to which are attributed gates (Isa, xxniii. 10) and abysmal depths (Prov. iL 18); and the second a trackless waste, iu which wanderers having lost their way stumbie forward to destruction (Rev. ix. 11). On the exact import of the two t.erms which are here used as synonyms for the disem- bodied state, the Exposition may be consulted. (2) The situ11.tion assigned to this im-isible region-under the waters, i.e. beneath the ocean (of. Luke viii. 31), or in the lowest parts of the earth (Eph. iv. 9), at the remotest distance from heaven (Ps. oxxxix, 8); and therefore, as such, a fitting receptacle for the dead (Rom. x. 7), and a proper place of confinem3nt for the wicked (Ps. Iv. 15). (3) The persons who inhabit this sunless region. While departed spirits generally are commonly represented as descend• ing into Sheol (eh. xiv. 13-15; xvii. 15, 16), it is here the shades of the wicked that are spoken of as t.enanting its chambers. The Rephaim alluded to by Job were not the people of that name, but the pale, flaccid, bloodl8&' ghosts of dead persons (Iso..xiv.10), in particular, it is supposed, of the giants, or mighty ones (Gen. vi. 4), who perished in the Deluge, since the word" Rcphaim" may alao signify heroes of colossal stature. (4) The misery experienced in this doleful region. Besides being a place of darkness (eh. L 21, 22; Ps. lxxxviii. 12) and of pain (eh. xiv. 22) generally, it is here oorhibited as being specially a place of anguish for the wicked, whose marrowless and bloodless phantoms shiver and writhe, as if they were undergoing the pains of parturition every time the majesty of God is felt by them, " as perhaps by the raging of the sea, or the quaking of the earth" (Delitzsch). And certainly in other Scriptures the Hadean or disembodied state is set forth as a place of woe for the ungodly (Matt. v. 29; xviii. 8, 9 ; :Mark ix. 43; Luke xvi. 25). So the ancient Egyptians celebrated Ra as "the supreme power who cuts off the bead of those who are in the infernal regions" (vide 'Records of the Past,' vol. viii. p. 111). (5) The supreme Lord of this subterranean region; he is not the .A.baddon of the Apocalypse (Rev. ix. 11), but Shaddai, whoHe majesty Job depicts, since his eyes penetrate to its darkest depths, and his arm reaches to its remotest corners. .A.s David testifies to God's presence in Sheol (Ps. c:uxix. 8), so Job affirms that presence to be the trae cause of the misery of the lost, as John afterwards declares it to be the secret source of happiness to the saved (Rev. vii.15). 2. In the realm of creation. (V' ers. 7-13.) Rising from the dark underworld, Job expatiates on the great power of God as displayed in the world of light. (1) In spreading out the northern firmament above the self-poised earth (ver. 7). That Job here alludes to the northern hemisphere of the sky which he, in common with the ancients generally, believed to be a vast arch, vault, or canopy extended above the earth, and folding it in like a tent, is more certain than it is that he anticipated the discoveries of modern astronomy concerning the sphericity and revolutions of the earth, although there is some reason for believing that these were understood by tbe ancient Egyptians, But whether or not Job had attained to a dim guess of the earth's form, he distinctly understood that it rested with its aerial canopy on no material prop, but was supported solely by the power of God. The continual upholding, not of this globe merely, but of innumerable worlds, of suns and systems past reckoning, by the word of his power, is a signal demonstration of God's almightiness. (2) In appointing the meteorological laws of the atmosphere (vers. e, 9), by which first rain is collected in the clouds, then the clouds are preserved from bursting kfore the proper moment beneath the weight of the watery particles they contain, and thirdly, the dark masses are spread around God's throne, i.e. distributed over the face of tbe sky previously to bursting forth upon the thirsty soiL The clouds are pre- eminently his cloudB, i.e. God's; since he hath ordained the wonderful mechanism by which they are formed, preserved, dispersed, distributed, and emptied; since he employs them in accordance with his own sovereign will, e.g. to shut off the face of his throne from tbe gaze of man whensoever it may please him; and since wben they descend upon tbe earth they seem to proceed from bis throne. (3) In establishing a bound between light and darkness (ver. 10). Job J.'Brhaps imagined that the globe was encompassed by &n ocean, out of which the sun rose in Oriental splendour, and ,into which again it OH, XXVI, 1-14.] THE BOOK OF ,JOB,