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
Job 9:9 Which maketh Arcturus, Orion, and Pleiades, and the chambers of the south.
Psalms 104:3 Who layeth the beams of his chambers in the waters: who maketh the clouds his chariot: who walketh upon the wings of the wind:
Isaiah 21:1 The burden of the desert of the sea. As whirlwinds in the south pass through; so it cometh from the desert, from a terrible land.
Job 38:1 Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said,
Zechariah 9:14 And the LORD shall be seen over them, and his arrow shall go forth as the lightning: and the Lord GOD shall blow the trumpet, and shall go w…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Job 37:6-13
The changes and extremities of the weather, wet or dry, hot or cold, are the subject of a great deal of our common talk and observation; but how seldom do we think and speak of these things, as Elihu does here, with an awful regard to God the director of them, who shows his power and serves the purposes of his providence by them! We must take notice of the glory of God, not only in the thunder and lightning, but in the more common revolutions of the weather, which are not so terrible and which make less noise. As,
I. In the snow and rain, Job 37:6. Thunder and lightning happen usually in the summer, but here he takes notice of the winter-weather. Then he saith to the snow, Be thou on the ear…
south--literally, "chambers"; connected with the south (Job 9:9). The whirlwinds are poetically regarded as pent up by God in His southern chambers, whence He sends them forth (so Job 38:22; Psa 135:7). As to the southern whirlwinds (see Isa 21:1; Zac 9:14), they drive before them burning sands; chiefly from February to May.
the north--literally, "scattering"; the north wind scatters the clouds.
Adam Clarke on Job 37:9
Out of the south cometh the whirlwind - See the note on Job 9:9. What is rendered south here, is there rendered chambers. Mr. Good translates here, the utmost zone. The Chaldee: - "From the supreme chamber the commotion shall come; and from the cataracts of Arcturus the cold." What the whirlwind, סופה suphah, is, we know not. It might have been a wind peculiar to that district; and it is very possible that it was a scorching wind, something like the simoom.
John Gill on Job 37:9
Out of the south cometh the whirlwind,.... Or "from the chamber" (n); from the chamber of the cloud, as Ben Gersom, from the inside of it; or from the treasury of God, who bringeth the wind out of his treasures; alluding to chambers where treasures are kept; or from the heavens, shut up and veiled around with clouds like a pavilion: but because we read of the chambers of the south, Job 9:9; and the southern pole was like a secret chamber, shut up, unseen, and unknown very much to the ancients; hence we render it, and others interpret it, of the south; from whence in these countries came whirlwinds. Hence we read of the whirlwinds of the south, Isaiah 21:1;
and cold out of the north; cold fr…
The Church Fathers
"The storm has risen from the depths of their retreat. The temptation came to him by quite mysterious ways. "The cold has come out of the heights. The judgment has secretly come upon those who have not persevered; their charity has cooled, because of the abundance of their iniquities. Punishment well deserved, since they put their hope not in God, but in man.
A tempest will come forth from the inner parts, and cold from Arcturus. When Holy Scripture mentions the inner parts, in opposition to Arcturus, it designates the quarter of the South, opposite to the parts of the North. Whence it is written in this same book; Who maketh Arcturus, and the Orions, and the inner parts of the South. [Job 9, 9] Because then the sun pervades with greater warmth the inner parts of the South, but does not pursue its course at all in the North, by the word 'inner parts' in this place is expressed the Jewish people, but by the term 'Arcturus' the Gentile people. For they who had known the One and Invisible God, and obeyed His Law, at least carnally, were kept, as it were, in the warmth of faith, under the glow of the midday sun. But because the Gentiles had not attained to any knowledge of heavenly wisdom, they were remaining, as it were, in the cold, without the sun, under the North. But because a tempest impels, but cold oppresses with torpor; it is now rightly said, A tempest will come forth from the inner parts, and cold from Arcturus. As if it were plainly said; From the Jews there arises persecuting malice, and from the Gentiles oppressing power. For the precepts of the Law had not forbidden the performance of miracles, and yet the Jews sought to kill the Redeemer of the human race on account of these very miracles. And hence when unable to fulfil what they had begun, they flocked to the hall of Pilate, in order that he, whom no law could restrain when murdering unjustly, might himself put Him to death. A tempest therefore came forth from the inner parts, and cold from Arcturus, whilst the Gentile judge perpetrated with the authority of Rome, that which the Jews requested through envy.
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
South — Heb. Negeb, that arid district to the south of Palestine through which lay the caravan route from Central Palestine to Egypt (Gen. 12:9; 13:1, 3; 46:1-6). “The Negeb comprised a considerable but…
Providence Of God, The · Is exercised in: Ruling the elements — Is exercised in: Ruling the elements
Religion · NATURAL — NATURAL
Weather · Sayings concerning — Sayings concerning
Whirlwind · From the — From the
Wind · .Tempestuous — .Tempestuous
Wind, The · Mentioned in scripture: The whirlwind — Mentioned in scripture: The whirlwind
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).
6 For He saith to the snow: Fall towards the earth,
And to the rain-shower
And the showers of His mighty rain.
7 He putteth a seal on the hand of every man,
That all men may come to a knowledge of His creative work.
8 The wild beast creepeth into a hiding-place,
And in its resting-place it remaineth.
9 Out of the remote part cometh the whirlwind,
And cold from the cloud-sweepers.
10 From the breath of God cometh ice,
And the breadth of the waters is straitened.
Like אבי, Job 34:36, and פּשׁ, Job 35:15, הוא, Job 37:6 (is falsely translated "be earthwards" by lxx, Targ., and Syr.), also belongs to the most striking Arabisms of the Elihu section: it signifies delabere (Jer. ut descendat), a sig…
