Глава 39

1–30. Description of the animal kingdom. 31–35. Job's humility. Job 39:1. Do you know the time when wild goats are born on the rocks, and have you noticed the birth of fallow deer? Job 39:2. can you calculate the months of their pregnancy? and do you know the time of their birth? Job 39:3. They bend, giving birth to their children, throwing away their burdens; Job 39:4. their children come into strength, grow up in the field, leave and do not return to them. Wild goats and chamois, as if realizing their helplessness during pregnancy and childbirth, retire during this time to mountainous areas inaccessible to their enemies - people and animals, and here they give birth and raise their children. Therefore, a person does not know when they give birth and cannot “calculate the months of their pregnancy.” Job 39:5. Who set the wild ass free, and who loosed the onager's bonds, Job 39:6. to whom I have appointed the steppe as a home and the salt marshes as a dwelling? Job 39:7. He laughs at the city crowd and does not hear the cries of the driver, Job 39:8. he searches for food in the mountains and chases after all kinds of greenery. Wild ass – Heb. “pere” from “para” – “to run quickly”, the Asian “kulan”, is one of those animals that cannot be tamed by humans. An inhabitant of the steppes, he finds his food in salt marshes, cannot stand city noise and cannot, like a domestic donkey, be adapted to carry heavy loads. Job 39:9. Will the unicorn want to serve you and spend the night at your manger? Job 39:10. Can you tie a unicorn to a furrow with a rope, and will he harrow the field after you? Job 39:11. Will you trust in him, because his strength is great, and will you give him your work? Job 39:12. Will you believe him that he will return your seeds and put them on your threshing floor? A similar inability to tame is distinguished by the animal "rheum", "unicorn" of the synodal reading, "μονοκέρως" LXX, ῥινοκέρως of Aquila and the Vulgate (false interpretation of μονοκερως LXX). exegetes - Delitzsch, Lange and others, based on the Talmud, the evidence of Pliny the Younger and Egyptian monuments about the one-horned antelope, understand by the “rheum” the white gazelle found in Syria to this day - the oryx. And finally, the third: Gesenius, De Wette, Umbreit, see in it a wild bull. The last opinion is perhaps the most correct. a domestic animal used for cultivating fields, i.e., an ox; the wild bull is similar to the latter. Job 39:13–18. Description of the ostrich. Just as the wild ass and bull, in contrast to the domestic ox and donkey, cannot be tamed, so the stork-like ostrich is distinguished by many features. Job 39:13. Did you give beautiful wings to the peacock and feathers and fluff to the ostrich? The literal reading of this verse should be: “The wing of an ostrich flutters merrily, is it a stork’s wing and feather”? Although the ostrich resembles a stork in the color of its feathers and its tendency to live in flocks, it is not like it in many ways. Job 39:14. He leaves his eggs on the ground and warms them on the sand, Job 39:15. and forgets that the foot can crush them and the beast of the field can trample them; Job 39:16. he is cruel to his children, as if they were not his own, and is not afraid that his work will be in vain; Job 39:17. because God did not give him wisdom and did not give him meaning; One of these features is the attitude of the ostrich towards its offspring. While the stork is gentle towards its children, which is why it is called “hasidah” - “pious,” the ostrich is cruel (v. 16; cf. Lamentations 4.3). He leaves his eggs to their fate, not at all worried that they may be crushed and devoured by animals. But this natural unreasonableness of the ostrich, which threatens its offspring with death, is eliminated by the fact that the desert itself, the hot sand, warms its eggs and hatches its children. His labor is not in vain (v. 16). Job 39:18. and when he rises to the heights, he laughs at the horse and his rider. Apparently helpless due to its inability to fly, the ostrich has a fast run that saves it from being pursued by enemies, including people. Job 39:19–25. After the description of the ostrich, this, as the Arabs put it, half camel, half bird, there follows a description of a horse, as if born, destined for battle. Job 39:19. Did you give the horse strength and clothe his neck with mane? And indeed, he was given the strength needed for war (Hebrew “geburah”; cf. Judges 8.21; 2 Kings 18.20). Job 39:20. Can you scare him away like a locust? The snoring of his nostrils is horror; Job 39:21. digs the ground with his foot and admires the strength; goes towards the weapon; Correct reading: “Will you make him jump like a locust?” Prancing, turning into a gallop, the horse makes leaps like locusts (cf. Joel 2.4), and the ardor it shows in this case is reflected in snoring, which frightens others, and the habit of beating and digging the ground with its hoof. Job 39:22. he laughs at danger and is not timid and does not turn away from the sword; Job 39:23. the quiver sounds above him, the spear and javelin sparkle; Job 39:24. in impetus and rage he swallows the earth and cannot stand at the sound of the trumpet; Job 39:25. at the sound of a trumpet he makes a voice: hoo! hoo! and from afar he senses the battle, the loud voices of the leaders and the cry. The ardor of the horse is not diminished by the situation of the battle. For her, the sword, the sparkle of the spear and the javelin are nothing, but the sounds of the trumpet, the signal horn used in war (Hebrew “shofar”, cf. Judges 3.27; 2 Samuel 2.28, 20.22), and the cries of the leaders make her even more excited. Job 39:26. Does the hawk fly with your wisdom and guide its wings to the noonday? Like other birds, the “nets” - “hawk” is endowed with the instinct to anticipate the onset of cold and fly to warm countries at noon during winter. Job 39:27. Is it at your word that the eagle ascends and builds its nest on high? Job 39:28. He lives on a rock and spends the night on the jagged cliffs and in inaccessible places; Job 39:29. from there he looks out for food: his eyes look far away; Job 39:30. His chicks drink blood, and where the corpse is, there he is. A series of phenomena of the animal world begins with a description of the king of beasts, the lion (Job 38.39), and ends with a description of the king of birds, the eagle. Its peculiarity is the habit of making a nest on the tops of mountains, in inaccessible places (cf. Jer 49.16), according to which it is given acute vision, which helps to look out for prey from heights inaccessible to humans. Job 39:31. And the Lord continued and said to Job: Job 39:32. will he who competes with the Almighty still teach? He who reproaches God, let him answer Him. Job 39:33. And Job answered the Lord and said: Job 39:34. behold, I am insignificant; How will I answer You? I place my hand on my mouth. Job 39:35. I said once, now I won’t answer, not even twice, but I won’t answer again. A whole series of questions showed Job how great the amount of data testifying to the dispensing wisdom of God is. Before them, the facts on which he based his view of divine arbitrariness are nothing. Therefore, there is no possibility of competing with God, and he responds to this challenge (v. 32) with silence: “I put my hand on my mouth” (cf. Job 21.5, 29.9). It marks a rejection of previous views and constitutes the first step in restoring a proper attitude towards God. Job was brought to such a state by the revelation of the thought of an all-wise and all-good God. The God who calms the sea, who waters the desert, who gives food to the raven, is the same God who punishes him so unjustly. But can the latter be allowed? Isn’t it better to admit that with the goodness of God this cannot happen? You might be interested in: