Teks -- Job 26:7 (NET)

26:7 He spreads out the northern skies over empty space; he suspends the earth on nothing.

Tafsiran/Catatan -- Catatan Kata/Frasa (per frasa)

Wesley: Job 26:7 - North

The northern part of the heavens, which is put for the whole visible heaven, because Job and his friends lived in a northern climate.

Wesley: Job 26:7 - Nothing

Upon no props or pillars, but his own power and providence.

JFB: Job 26:7

Hint of the true theory of the earth. Its suspension in empty space is stated in the second clause. The north in particular is specified in the first, being believed to be the highest part of the earth (Isa 14:13). The northern hemisphere or vault of heaven is included; often compared to a stretched-out canopy (Psa 104:2). The chambers of the south are mentioned (Job 9:9), that is, the southern hemisphere, consistently with the earth's globular form.

Clarke: Job 26:7 - He stretcheth out the north over the empty place

He stretcheth out the north over the empty place - על תהו al tohu , to the hollow waste. The same word as is used, Gen 1:2, The earth was without form, תהו tohu . The north must here mean the north pole, or northern hemisphere; and perhaps what is here stated may refer to the opinion that the earth was a vast extended plain, and the heavens poised upon it, resting on this plain all round the horizon. Of the south the inhabitants of Idumea knew nothing; nor could they have any notion of inhabitants in that hemisphere

Clarke: Job 26:7 - Hangeth the earth upon nothing

Hangeth the earth upon nothing - The Chaldee says: "He lays the earth upon the waters, nothing sustaining it."

Defender: Job 26:7 - empty place

The "empty place" (Hebrew tohu) probably refers to the just-created earth, which was initially "without form" (Gen 1:2)(same word, tohu). As earth received its spherical form, in response to the gravitational force systems activated when the Spirit moved in the presence of the primeval waters, then the north direction was defined when the earth began rotating about its axis. The north was surely "stretched out," without limit, far into the infinite heavens.

Defender: Job 26:7 - earth upon nothing

Not only was the earth rotating, but it also began orbiting in space, suspended from the sun by "nothing" except the mysterious force of gravity, acting at a distance. This verse was written at least 3500 years before Isaac Newton identified and described this force."

TSK: Job 26:7

Job 9:8; Gen 1:1, Gen 1:2; Psa 24:2, Psa 104:2-5; Pro 8:23-27; Isa 40:22, Isa 40:26, Isa 42:5

Tafsiran/Catatan -- Catatan Kata/Frasa (per Ayat)

Poole: Job 26:7 - The north // The empty place // Upon nothing

The north i.e. the northern pole, or part of the heavens, which he particularly mentions, and puts for the whole visible heaven, because Job and his friends lived in a northern climate, and were acquainted only with that part of the heavens, the southern pole and parts near it being wholly unknown to them. The heavens are oft and fitly said to be spread or stretched out like a curtain or tent, to which they are resembled.

The empty place to wit, the air, so called, not philosophically, as if it were wholly empty; but popularly, because it seems to be so, and is generally void of solid and visible bodies.

Upon nothing upon its own centre, which is but an imaginary thing, and in truth nothing; or upon no props or pillars, but his own power and providence; which is justly celebrated as a wonderful work of God, both in Scripture and in heathen authors.

Haydock: Job 26:7 - North // Nothing. Terra, pilæ similis, nullo fulcimine nixa

North pole, which alone was visible in Idumea, and continued unmoved, while all the stars performed their revolutions. (Calmet) ---

Nothing. Terra, pilæ similis, nullo fulcimine nixa. (Ovid, Fast, vi.) (Calmet) ---

All tends to the centre, (Menochius) by the laws of attraction. (Newton, &c.) (Haydock)

Gill: Job 26:7 - He stretcheth out the north over the empty place // and hangeth the earth upon nothing

He stretcheth out the north over the empty place,.... The northern hemisphere, which is the chief and best known, at least it was in the time of Job, when the southern hemisphere might not be known at all; though, if our version of Job 9:9 is right, Job seems to have had knowledge of it. Scheuchzer ^u thinks the thick air farthest north is meant, which expands itself everywhere, and is of great use to the whole earth. But if the northern hemisphere is meant, as a learned man ^w expresses it, it

"was not only principal as to Job's respect, and the position of Arabia, but because this hemisphere is absolutely so indeed, it is principal to the whole; for as the heavens and the earth are divided by the middle line, the northern half hath a strange share of excellency; we have more earth, more men, more stars, more day (the same also Sephorno, a Jewish commentator on the place, observes); and, which is more than all this, the north pole is more magnetic than the south:''

though the whole celestial sphere may be intended, the principal being put for the whole; even that whole expansion, or firmament of heaven, which has its name from being stretched out like a curtain, or canopy, over the earth; which was done when the earth was "tohu", empty of inhabitants, both men and beasts, and was without form and void, and had no beauty in it, or anything growing on it; see Gen 1:2;

and hangeth the earth upon nothing; as a ball in the air ^x, poised with its own weight ^y, or kept in this form and manner by the centre of gravity, and so some Jewish writers ^z interpret "nothing" of the centre of the earth, and which is nothing but "ens rationis", a figment and imagination of the mind; or rather the earth is held together, and in the position it is, by its own magnetic virtue, it being a loadstone itself; and as the above learned writer observes,

"the globe consisteth by a magnetic dependency, from which the parts cannot possibly start aside; but which, howsoever thus strongly seated on its centre and poles, is yet said to hang upon nothing; because the Creator in the beginning thus placed it within the "tohu", as it now also hangeth in the air; which itself also is nothing as to any regard of base or sustentation.''

In short, what the foundations are on which it is laid, or the pillars by which it is sustained, cannot be said, except the mighty power and providence of God. The word used seems to come from a root, which in the Syriac and Chaldee languages signifies to "bind and restrain"; and may design the expanse or atmosphere, so called from its binding and compressing nature, על, "in" or "within" which the earth is hung; see Psa 32:9.