1 Then the Lord answered Job out of a whirlwind, and said: 2 Who is this that wrappeth up sentences in unskillful words? 3 Gird up thy loins like a man: I will ask thee, and answer thou me. 4 Where wast thou when I laid up the foundations of the earth? tell me if thou hast understanding. 5 Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest? or who hath stretched the line upon it? 6 Upon what are its bases grounded? or who laid the corner stone thereof, 7 When the morning stars praised me together, and all the sons of God made a joyful melody? 8 Who shut up the sea with doors, when it broke forth as issuing out of the womb: 9 When I made a cloud the garment thereof, and wrapped it in a mist as in swaddling bands? 10 I set my bounds around it, and made it bars and doors: 11 And I said: Hitherto thou shalt come, and shalt go no further, and here thou shalt break thy swelling waves. 12 Didst thou since thy birth command the morning, and shew the dawning of the day its place? 13 And didst thou hold the extremities of the earth shaking them, and hast thou shaken the ungodly out of it? 14 The seal shall be restored as clay, and shall stand as a garment: 15 From the wicked their light shall be taken away, and the high arm shall be broken. 16 Hast thou entered into the depths of the sea, and walked in the lowest parts of the deep? 17 Have the gates of death been opened to thee, and hast thou seen the darksome doors? 18 Hast thou considered the breadth of the earth? tell me, if thou knowest all things? 19 Where is the way where light dwelleth, and where is the place of darkness: 20 That thou mayst bring every thing to its own bounds, and understand the paths of the house thereof. 21 Didst thou know then that thou shouldst be born? and didst thou know the number of thy days? 22 Hast thou entered into the storehouses of the snow, or has thou beheld the treasures of the hail: 23 Which I have prepared for the time of the enemy, against the day of battle and war? 24 By what way is the light spread, and heat divided upon the earth? 25 Who gave a course to violent showers, or a way for noisy thunder: 26 That it should rain on the earth without man in the wilderness, where no mortal dwelleth: 27 That it should fill the desert and desolate land, and should bring forth green grass? 28 Who is the father of rain? or who begot the drops of dew? 29 Out of whose womb came the ice; and the frost from heaven who hath gendered it? 30 The waters are hardened like a stone, and the surface of the deep is congealed. 31 Shalt thou be able to join together the shining stars the Pleiades, or canst thou stop the turning about of Arcturus? 32 Canst thou bring forth the day star in its time, and make the evening star to rise upon the children of the earth? 33 Dost thou know the order of heaven, and canst thou set down the reason thereof on the earth? 34 Canst thou lift up thy voice to the clouds, that an abundance of waters may cover thee? 35 Canst thou send lightnings, and will they go, and will they return and say to thee: Here we are? 36 Who hath put wisdom in the heart of man? or who gave the cock understanding? 37 Who can declare the order of the heavens, or who can make the harmony of heaven to sleep? 38 When was the dust poured on the earth, and the clods fastened together? 39 Wilt thou take the prey for the lioness, and satisfy the appetite of her whelps, 40 When they couch in the dens and lie in wait in holes? 41 Who provideth food for the raven, when her young ones cry to God, wandering about, because they have no meat?
Job · Douay-Rheims (Challoner), American Edition 1899
Job 38 Douay-Rheims (Challoner), American Edition 1899
Audio: World English Bible (WEB), read by Winfred W. Henson · About the recordings
Cross references (40)
Related passages for each verse, from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge as collected and ranked by readers at OpenBible.info.
- 1 Job 40:6; 2 Kings 2:11; Job 37:1–2; Exodus 19:16–19; 1 Kings 19:11
- 2 Job 42:3; Job 35:16; 1 Timothy 1:7; Job 34:35; Job 27:11
- 3 Job 40:7; Jeremiah 1:17; Exodus 12:11; 1 Kings 18:46; 1 Peter 1:13
- 4 Psalm 104:5; Hebrews 1:10; Proverbs 30:4; Hebrews 1:2; Psalm 102:25
- 5 Isaiah 40:12; Job 11:9; Zechariah 2:1–2; Proverbs 8:27; Isaiah 40:22
- 6 Job 26:7; Psalm 104:5; Psalm 93:1; Isaiah 28:16; 2 Peter 3:5
- 7 Revelation 5:11; Job 1:6; Ezra 3:11–12; Revelation 22:16; Revelation 2:28
- 8 Genesis 1:9; Proverbs 8:29; Jeremiah 5:22; Psalm 104:8–9; Psalm 33:7
- 9 Genesis 1:2
- 10 Jeremiah 5:22; Psalm 104:9; Psalm 33:7; Job 26:10; Genesis 1:9–10
- 11 Psalm 89:9; Proverbs 8:29; Psalm 65:6–7; Luke 8:32–33; Mark 4:39–41
- 12 Psalm 74:16; Psalm 148:3–5; Genesis 1:5; Job 8:9; Psalm 136:7–8
- 13 Psalm 104:35; Job 37:3; Exodus 14:27; Psalm 104:21–22; Job 24:13–17
- 14 Psalm 104:6; Psalm 104:2
- 15 Psalm 10:15; Psalm 37:17; Job 18:5; Proverbs 4:19; Ezekiel 30:22
- 16 Proverbs 8:24; Psalm 77:19; Job 26:5–6; Jeremiah 51:36
- 17 Psalm 9:13; Psalm 107:18; Job 3:5; Job 12:22; Psalm 107:14
- 18 Revelation 20:9; Psalm 89:11–12; Jeremiah 31:37; Isaiah 40:28; Job 28:24
- 19 Ezekiel 32:8; Matthew 27:45; Isaiah 45:7; Genesis 1:3–4; Amos 4:13
- 20 Job 26:10; Genesis 10:19; Genesis 23:17
- 21 Job 15:7; Job 38:4; Job 38:12
- 22 Job 37:6; Psalm 135:7; Psalm 33:7; Job 6:16
- 23 Joshua 10:11; Isaiah 30:30; Revelation 16:21; Exodus 9:18; Job 36:13
- 24 Job 38:12–13; Jonah 4:8; Matthew 24:27
- 25 Job 28:26; Psalm 29:3–10; Job 36:27–28; Job 37:3–6
- 26 Jeremiah 14:22; Psalm 107:35; Hebrews 6:7–8; Isaiah 35:1–2; Isaiah 43:19–20
- 27 Psalm 107:35; Psalm 104:14
- 28 Jeremiah 14:22; Psalm 147:8; Jeremiah 10:13; Proverbs 3:20; Deuteronomy 33:13
- 29 Psalm 147:16–17; Job 37:10; Job 6:16; Job 38:8
- 30 Job 37:10
- 31 Amos 5:8; Job 9:9
- 32 Job 38:31; 2 Kings 23:5; Job 9:9
- 33 Jeremiah 31:35–36; Genesis 8:22; Psalm 148:6; Job 38:12–13; Jeremiah 33:25
- 34 Job 22:11; Zechariah 10:1; James 5:18; Job 36:27–28; 1 Samuel 12:18
- 35 Job 36:32; Job 37:3; 2 Kings 1:14; Revelation 11:5–6; Numbers 16:35
- 36 Job 32:8; Psalm 51:6; Proverbs 2:6; Ecclesiastes 2:26; James 1:5
- 37 Psalm 147:4; Genesis 9:15; Genesis 8:1; Genesis 15:5
- 39 Psalm 104:21; Job 4:10–11; Psalm 34:10; Psalm 145:15–16
- 40 Job 37:8; Numbers 24:9; Numbers 23:24; Genesis 49:9
- 41 Luke 12:24; Matthew 6:26; Psalm 147:9; Psalm 104:27–28
Cross references: OpenBible.info (CC BY), drawn mainly from the public-domain Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. · Sources & licences
What the Fathers said
Passages from the Church Fathers that expound or quote this chapter, verbatim from the public-domain Schaff edition (19th-century English translations).
How these were chosen
“Commentary” is the opening of a homily or exposition on this chapter (John Chrysostom’s homilies, Augustine’s tractates, sermons and expositions of the Psalms). “Quotes” are sentences where the edition’s own footnotes identify a quotation of a verse here, kept only when the wording matches the verse. Only works whose authorship is not in doubt are used. Psalms follow the Hebrew/English numbering (Augustine numbers them as the Septuagint does: his Psalm 50 is Psalm 51 here).
Who is the father of the rain? And who hath begotten the drops of dew?
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, vol. 7 (1894)
And yet, O talkative Dialectician, I will ask thee one small question, and answer thou me, as He saith to Job, Who through whirlwind and cloud giveth Divine admonitions. Are there many mansions in God's House, as thou hast heard, or only one?
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, vol. 7 (1894)
Put then a limit to your thought, so that your curiosity in investigating the incomprehensible may not incur the reproaches of Job, and you be not asked by him, "Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened?" If ever you hear in the Psalms, "I bear up the pillars of it;" see in these pillars the power which sustains it.
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, vol. 8 (1895)
… condensed the air into clouds, and bade them carry the waters of the rain, now bringing golden-tinted clouds from the north, now changing these into one uniform appearance, and again transforming them into manifold circles and other shapes? Who can number the clouds in wisdom?
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, vol. 7 (1894)
Whereof in Job it saith, And He knoweth the separations of the clouds, and hath bent down the heaven to the earth: and, He who numbereth the clouds in wisdom: and, the cloud is not rent under Him.
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, vol. 7 (1894)