Job 36:30

Behold, he spreadeth his light upon it, and covereth the bottom of the sea.

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Word by word — the Hebrew

Word	Hebrew	Strong’s	Meaning
spreadeth	פָּרַ֣שׂ pa.Ras	H6566	to break apart · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
light	אוֹר֑וֹ 'o.Ro	H216	illumination or (concrete) luminary (in every sense · noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
covereth	כִּסָּֽה ki.Sah	H3680	properly · verb, piel perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
bottom	וְשָׁרְשֵׁ֖י ve.sha.re.Shei	H8328	a root (literally or figuratively) · conjunction + noun, common masculine plural construct
sea	הַיָּ֣ם hai.Yam	H3220	a sea (as breaking in noisy surf) or large body of water · definite article + noun, common masculine singular absolute

Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).

Cross-references

Genesis 1:9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
Exodus 14:22 And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon the dry ground: and the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand, and…
Exodus 14:28 And the waters returned, and covered the chariots, and the horsemen, and all the host of Pharaoh that came into the sea after them; there re…
Exodus 15:4-5 Pharaoh’s chariots and his host hath he cast into the sea: his chosen captains also are drowned in the Red sea.
Job 38:8-11 Or who shut up the sea with doors, when it brake forth, as if it had issued out of the womb?
Job 38:25 Who hath divided a watercourse for the overflowing of waters, or a way for the lightning of thunder;
Job 38:34-35 Canst thou lift up thy voice to the clouds, that abundance of waters may cover thee?
Psalms 18:11-16 He made darkness his secret place; his pavilion round about him were dark waters and thick clouds of the skies.

Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).

Commentary

Matthew Henry on Job 36:24–end

Elihu is here endeavouring to possess Job with great and high thoughts of God, and so to persuade him into a cheerful submission to his providence. I. He represents the work of God, in general, as illustrious and conspicuous, Job 36:24. His whole work is so. God does nothing mean. This is a good reason why we should acquiesce in all the operations of his providence concerning us in particular. His visible works, those of nature, and which concern the world in general, are such as we admire and commend, and in which we observe the Creator's wisdom, power, and goodness; shall we then find fault with his dispensations concerning us, and the counsels of his will concerning our affairs? We are he…

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Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on Job 36:30

light--lightning. it--His tabernacle (Job 36:29). The light, in an instant spread over the vast mass of dark clouds, forms a striking picture. spread--is repeated from Job 36:29 to form an antithesis. "He spreads not only clouds, but light." covereth the bottom--roots. of the sea--namely, with the light. In the storm the depths of ocean are laid bare; and the light "covers" them, at the same moment that it "spreads" across the dark sky. So in Psa 18:14-15, the discovering of "the channels of waters" follows the "lightnings." UMBREIT translates: "He spreadeth His light upon Himself, and covereth Himself with the roots of the sea" (Psa 104:2). God's garment is woven of celestial light…

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Adam Clarke on Job 36:30

He spreadeth his light upon it - Or, as Mr. Good translates, "He throweth forth from it his flash." These two verses may both have an allusion to the sudden rarefaction of that part of the atmosphere whence the thunder proceeds, by the agency of the electric fluid; the rushing in of the air on each side to restore the equilibrium, which the passage of the fire had before destroyed. The noise produced by this sudden rushing in of the air, as well as that occasioned by the ignition of the hydrogen gas, which is one of the constituents of water, is the thunder of his tabernacle, viz., the atmosphere, where God appears, in such cases, to be manifesting his presence and his power. Elihu says that…

The Church Fathers

"Behold, he hath poured out all his light on him." He hid it, and when part of Israel fell into blindness, he poured it out on all the nations. "He has covered the depths of the sea." He has confused the insatiability of this world, for the light shows itself, not to obscure, but to illuminate. He judged the nations, showing them their iniquities with the torch of truth.
— Augustine of Hippo, ANNOTATIONS ON THE BOOK OF JOB (tr. J. Litteral, draft)

The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).

Dictionary and topics

Light · Described as: Diffusive — Described as: Diffusive

Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).

Job 36:30

Word by word — the Hebrew

Cross-references

Commentary

Matthew Henry on Job 36:24–end

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on Job 36:30

Adam Clarke on Job 36:30

The Church Fathers

Dictionary and topics

Job 36:30

Word by word — the Hebrew

Cross-references

Commentary

Matthew Henry on Job 36:24–end

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on Job 36:30

Adam Clarke on Job 36:30

The Church Fathers

Dictionary and topics

John Gill on Job 36:30

Keil & Delitzsch on Job 36:30–end

Tyndale Open Study Notes on Job 36:12

Rashi on Job 36:30