Add parallel Print Page Options

31 Can you tie the bands[a] of the Pleiades,
or release the cords of Orion?
32 Can you lead out
the constellations[b] in their seasons,
or guide the Bear with its cubs?[c]
33 Do you know the laws of the heavens,
or can you set up their rule over the earth?

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. Job 38:31 tn This word is found here and in 1 Sam 15:32. Dhorme suggests, with others, that there has been a metathesis (a reversal of consonants), and it is the same word found in Job 31:36 (“bind”). G. R. Driver takes it as “cluster” without changing the text (“Two astronomical passages in the Old Testament,” JTS 7 [1956] :3).
  2. Job 38:32 tn The word מַזָּרוֹת (mazzarot) is taken by some to refer to the constellations (see 2 Kgs 23:5), and by others as connected to the word for “crown,” and so “corona.”
  3. Job 38:32 sn See Job 9:9.

31 “Can you bind the chains[a] of the Pleiades?
    Can you loosen Orion’s belt?(A)
32 Can you bring forth the constellations(B) in their seasons[b]
    or lead out the Bear[c] with its cubs?(C)
33 Do you know the laws(D) of the heavens?(E)
    Can you set up God’s[d] dominion over the earth?

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. Job 38:31 Septuagint; Hebrew beauty
  2. Job 38:32 Or the morning star in its season
  3. Job 38:32 Or out Leo
  4. Job 38:33 Or their