The ecological potential of the rain in Job 38:25-27

This strophe has a different perspective from Elihu’s statement in Job 36:27-28 about the rain. The strophe describes the delivery of rain on earth in torrents even on the land which is apparently useless for humans (vv.25-27). In contrast to Elihu’s speech which is about God as ‘rainmaker’, there is nothing here about ‘creation’ but rather the regular cycle of nature (Clines 2011:1110).

The word הׇ לׇ עׇ ת is used as stream/channel for ף ט ש לׇג לִפ212 (cutting out for the flood).213 The course (ה ל ע ) that the rain takes links the sky (ׇ ת םִׇיׇ מׇ ש) and the earth as for the flood account where the waters-above fall down via a great gate (תׇ בׇֻׁרֲׇא) of the sky (Gn 7:11). The word ה ל ע (course, v.25) could be a surprising term here for the rain which ׇ ת normally falls in drops rather than as an unending stream as in 2 Kings 18:17 or Isaiah 7:3 where ה ל ע is used for a constant conduit of a pool (Sutcliffe 1953:101). ׇ ת

However, the focus in verse 25 is on ף (flood of water-above) which was believed ׇ טׇ ש to be held/limited in the sky ( ׇ מםִׇי ש) and sometimes might fall earthward through rain by following a fixed conduit (ה ל ע ). This airy aqueduct was viewed as means of both ׇ ת ensuring and regulating the supply of upper-waters on Earth:

Given that these upper – waters are supported by the solid vault of the heavens [sky] and yet descend upon the earth, it was believed that there must be apertures [holes/channels] in the sky capable of being opened and shut as occasion requires. If these were opened and the water allowed to descend on the earth without the intermediary of clouds, the effect was devastating and destructive, (Genesis 7: 11; 8:2, Isaiah 24:18) (Stucliffe 1953:99)

212

The piel ג לִפ comes from the root גלפ (divide), which is used here in the sense of cutting out a channel for the flood to fall earthward. In Psalm 65:10 the word ג לִפ is used in association with God, םיִׇהלֱׇאׇגׇ לׇ פ (rivers of God):

You visit the earth and water it, you greatly enrich it; the river of God (םיהלאׇגלפ) is full of water; you provide the people with grain, for so you have prepared it (NRSV).

213 _{It serves as a transition from the storehouse of hail and snow in Job 38:22-24 to the theme of rain in Job}

38:25-27, the various kinds of moisture in Job 38:28-30, the rule (influence) of the stars on the seasons (Job 38:31-33) and the rainclouds and lightning in verses 34-38.

In this sense, the rainstorm ( ֲׇחזי ) also has a fixed way ( ׇ דִׇז ךְ ) to follow in its distribution ׇ ר of lightning and moisture on earth. It should be noted that rains in ancient Israel were often accompanied by violent lightning so that Psalm 135:7 declares that YHWH made the lightning for the rain.214 Indeed, the terms ה ל ע and ׇ דׇ ת ךְ (course and way) ׇ ר and the notion of ‘time’ emphasise the principle of the cosmic order, otherwise an accidental rain could result in disastrous effects as Reymond (1958:5) declares:

Une pluie accidentelle venant au milieu de l’été ne serait guère utile si ce n’est pour rafraîchir l’atmosphère et donner un supplément d’eau potable; mais souvent elle risque d’être nuisible en détruisant les récoltes par sa violence.215

In this sense, in the Ancient Near East, the solidity of the dome (ׇ עי ) and the blue ִׇקׇָּׁר colour of the sky (םִׇיׇ מׇ ש) were assumed as holding the upper – waters216 so that they may fall down at specific times. The word םִׇיׇ מׇ ש is etymologically defined as ‘what relates to water’.217 _{Therefore, ‘as water falls, in the form of rain, from on high, the} only conclusion possible seemed to be that there exists above a great reservoir and the only position that could be assigned for this was above the vault of heaven’ (Sutcliffe 1953:99). The idea in Job 38:25 is not about the ordinary rain (ר or ׇ טׇ מ ר ), but ׇ חׇ מ torrential rainfall (ףׇ טׇ שׇ לׇגׇ לִׇפ) that follows a given course (ה ל ע ) to reach the earth and ׇ ת overwhelm it with life-giving or life-threatening waters.

However, the significance of the ףׇ טׇ שׇ לׇגׇ לִׇפ (torrential rains) and thunderstorm218 ( ֲׇחזי ) ִׇז is not just on their ways (ה ל ע & ׇ דׇ ת ךְ ), but mostly on their life-giving beneficial supply ׇ ר of water through rain over the land where no one lives (v.26). While Job alleged that God withholds and releases celestial waters (Job 12:15) as well as the storm (Job 9:17)

214_{In ancient Israel people knew that lightning is often followed at once by increased violence in the rainfall}

(Sutcliffe 1953:103).

215_{English translation: An accidental rain falling during the middle of summer would be only helpful to refresh}

the atmosphere and give a supplement of drinking water; but often it may be harmful by destroying crops by its violence (the researcher’s own translation).

216 _{For the ancients, the sky’s colour was blue like that of the ocean, because the water above was seen through}

the expanse. Hence, Ezekiel 1:26 depicts the colour of the expanse, when looked upon, as that of sapphire. And since there is water above the sky, some passages in the Bible declare that the upper waters/fountains may rain down or pour out in a flood when the window in the skies is opened (Gn 7:11; 8:2 & Is 24:18). For more details, see Kee, M S 2012. A Study on the Dual Form of Mayim, Water. JBQ 40/3, 185ff.

217 _{Sachs maintains that the Hebrew letter ש prefixed to the three-letter root ׇ מם extends the underlying idea of ִׇי}

םִי מ ש (sha-mayim) as the superlative of ׇ מם (water) suggesting that there is water above the sky (2006:130). ִׇי

218 _{In his article about ‘clouds as water-carriers’, Sutcliffe observed that in the ancient Israel’s thought,}

‘lightning is often followed at once by increased violence in the rainfall, for this seems to be the meaning of the words used of God, that He “made lightning flashes for the rain”’ (1953:103).

for destructive rather than salutary purpose, Job 38:26-27 provides the antithesis. God sends the rain to irrigate the desolate and wasteland (הׇ אׇ שׇ מוׇהׇ אׇ ש) and to cause the dry ground to put forth fresh grass (Job 38:27).

The word הׇ אׇ ש (shoah) implies total desolation and it is contemporarily utilised for the crime of the Jewish holocaust (Crenshaw 2005b:182).219 In the Bible, the expression

ׇ ש ׇ א וׇה ׇ מ ׇ ש ׇ א

ה also occurs in Job 30:3 and Zephaniah 1:15 to mean terrible affliction. In Job 30:3 the words are used for people who are accounted among dogs and ‘gnaw at the desolate ground’ (ה אׇ שׇ מוׇ ה אׇ ש). Job 38:27 implies that God sends life-giving rain even to those places that Job (humans) usually despises. In other words, ‘God satisfies even such a desolate place, providing rain so that it sprouts grass, bringing forth life in a land that humanity has rejected as worthless’220

(Schifferdecker 2008:71).

In contrast to Elihu’s speech, the water-related phenomena are seen not for their usefulness for humans, but for their own value and their power of creating life in the wilderness. Job 38:26-27 testifies to the awareness of the intrinsic worth of water. The target of the rain in this text is not just the productive land worked to satisfy human hunger as in Job 36:27-28, but the wilderness which is transformed into a fertile land. Although the animals are not referred to explicitly, they are implied as the beneficiaries of such rain that results in dry ground putting forth their foodstuff (Job 38:27).