Thomas Aquinas Commentary Job 38:1-12

"Then Jehovah answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said, Who is this that darkeneth counsel By words without knowledge? Gird up now thy loins like a man; For I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto me. Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? Declare, if thou hast understanding. Who determined the measures thereof, if thou knowest? Or who stretched the line upon it? Whereupon were the foundations thereof fastened? Or who laid the corner-stone thereof, When the morning stars sang together, And all the sons of God shouted for joy? Or [who] shut up the sea with doors, When it brake forth, [as if] it had issued out of the womb; When I made clouds the garment thereof, And thick darkness a swaddling-band for it, And marked out for it my bound, And set bars and doors, And said, Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further; And here shall thy proud waves be stayed? Hast thou commanded the morning since thy days [began], [And] caused the dayspring to know its place;" — Job 38:1-12 (ASV)

After the discussion about divine providence between Job and his friends, Eliud had taken it upon himself to resolve the matter, contradicting Job in some things and his friends in others. But because human wisdom is insufficient to understand the truth of divine providence, it was necessary for this dispute to be settled by divine authority.

Job had thought correctly about divine providence, but his manner of speaking had gone to excess, causing scandal in the hearts of the others who thought he was not showing due reverence to God. Therefore, the Lord, as the arbiter of the question, contradicts Job’s friends because they did not think correctly (Job 42:7), Job himself for his disordered way of speaking (Job 38:3 and following), and Eliud for his inadequate resolution of the question (Job 38:2).

So the text continues, The Lord answered Job, because this answer was primarily for his sake, even though he had not been the one speaking immediately before. The text then shows the manner of the response, saying, out of the whirlwind. This can be understood literally to mean that God’s voice was formed miraculously in the air by a disturbance, as happened on Mount Sinai (Exodus 20:18), or like the voice that spoke to Christ, which some said was like a clap of thunder, as we read in John 12:29.

Alternatively, this can be understood metaphorically, so that the Lord’s answer is an interior inspiration divinely given to Job. In this case, the Lord is said to have answered him out of the whirlwind, both because of the turmoil Job still suffered and because of the darkness that accompanies a whirlwind. For in this life, we cannot perceive divine inspiration clearly, but only through the obscurity of sensible likenesses, as Dionysius says in chapter one of The Heavenly Hierarchy. The Lord would have indicated this even if He had made His voice audibly heard from a physical whirlwind.

Once a dispute has been settled by the judge’s opinion, nothing more remains to be said unless that settlement is rejected. So, the Lord first rejects the resolution that Eliud had made. He rejects it because Eliud had wrapped the true opinions he proposed in many false and frivolous words. Thus the text continues, He said: Who is that man who envelops his opinions with inept arguments? In his arguments, Eliud had accused Job of saying he wanted to dispute with God and had asserted his own justice so vigorously that he seemed to detract from the justice of the divine judgment. But Eliud enveloped these opinions with many presumptuous and even false statements, as should be clear by now. These are called “inept arguments” here because every lack of order proceeds from a defect of reason.

After rejecting Eliud’s resolution, the Lord Himself begins to settle the question. First, He gets Job’s attention, saying, Gird up your loins like a man, which is used here as a metaphor. Men usually gird up their loins to prepare for a journey or some work. The Lord, therefore, wanted Job to be ready to consider what He said to him by removing every impediment.

He tells him to gird up his loins because, metaphorically, the loins signify carnal desires, which especially block spiritual attention. As Isaiah says, To whom will he teach knowledge, and whom will he make understand what has been heard? Those who have been weaned from milk, those taken from the breast (Isaiah 28:9).

The Lord begins His resolution by accusing Job of having spoken presumptuously when he provoked God to a discussion. Since Job seems to have given God two options when he said, Call me and I will answer you, or let me speak and you answer me (Job 13:22), and since Job had already said enough, the Lord, as if choosing the second alternative, says, let me speak and you answer me.

God certainly does not question in order to learn, but to convince man of his own ignorance. He questions Job about His works, which are accessible to human senses. When a man is shown to be ignorant of these things, he is even more convinced that he lacks knowledge of higher realities. Among other tangible works, He begins by asking about the principal parts of the world, starting with the earth, which is most known to us because it is most immediate to our experience. He asks, Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?

He rightly compares the earth to a foundation because, just as a foundation is the lowest part of a building, so the earth is the lowest of bodies and lies under everything. Since the earth is the principal matter of the human body, and matter precedes in time that which is made from it, the plan of the artisan who assembles the matter precedes it even more. Thus, He clearly says, Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? as if to say: You cannot know the plan for the earth’s foundation, because when the earth was founded, you did not yet exist.

Some of the ancients did not attribute the position of the earth and the other elements to an ordering plan, but to material necessity, according to which heavy elements sank below light ones. To disprove this opinion, the Lord compares the foundation of the earth to that of a building, which is constructed according to the architect’s plans. In the same way, the earth’s foundation was made according to divine providence, which human intelligence cannot fully comprehend. He makes this clear when He says, Tell me, if you have understanding, as if to say: You cannot explain the reason for these things because your intelligence is not capable of grasping them. An artisan considers four things when laying a building’s foundation.

1. He determines how large the foundation should be. In the same way, divine reason has determined how great a quantity the earth should have, and not larger or smaller. He expresses this by saying, Who determined its measurements? He says “determined” because the earth’s shape does not require a certain quantity by necessity; rather, this quantity was imposed on the earth by divine reason, which man cannot know. So He says, if you know it, since man cannot know or tell this.
2. He determines the site of the foundation, which he marks out by extending a measuring line. Thus, He says, or who stretched the measuring line upon the earth? This refers to the plan of divine government that determined the place for the earth within the universe.
3. After determining the size and location, he determines on what the foundation can be solidly laid. Regarding this, He asks, On what were its bases sunk, for it was founded on the center of the world.
4. After considering these three things, the artisan begins to lay the stones in the foundation, starting with the cornerstone to which the different walls are aligned. Regarding this, He asks, or who has laid the cornerstone, by which the very center of the earth is determined, according to which the different parts of the earth are aligned.

A man usually lays a building’s foundation because he needs a place to live. But to show that God did not lay the foundation of the earth out of need, He adds, when each of the morning stars praised me, as if to say: Although heaven, whose stars praise Me, is My dwelling, I still founded the earth—not because I need the servants who live there, but from My will alone.

He does not say this as though heaven were made before the earth, especially since we read in Genesis, In the beginning God created heaven and earth (Genesis 1:1), and the text says the stars mentioned here were created on the fourth day (Genesis 1:14). Instead, this is said to show that in the order of nature, heaven and the stars are prior to the earth, as the incorruptible is to the corruptible and the mover is to the moved.

He says the “morning stars,” meaning newly created ones, just as we call the stars that appear at the beginning of the day morning stars. The fact that the morning stars are said to praise God can be understood in one way materially, since by their brightness and nobility they were the substance of divine praise—if not for men, who did not yet exist, then at least for the angels who did. Alternatively, according to those who say the heavenly bodies have souls, the stars praised God at the beginning of their creation, not with vocal but with mental praise. This can also refer to the angels whose ministry is to move the heavenly bodies, as the text continues, and all the sons of God shouted for joy. This refers to the angels of the highest hierarchy, whom Dionysius says are located in the entrance court of God. Therefore, He attributes praise to the former stars as to the lower angels, but He attributes shouting for joy to the latter as to the higher angels, because this connotes a kind of excellence in praise.

After discussing the earth’s foundation, He continues by speaking about the waters, which are placed immediately over the land. The natural order of the elements requires that water surround the earth at every point, just as air surrounds both earth and water. But by divine disposition, for the sake of generating humans, animals, and plants, some part of the land remains uncovered by the waters. God holds back the sea within certain limits by His power, and so He asks, Who shut up the sea with doors?

Some have thought that the sun’s action dried up part of the earth, but the Lord shows that it was arranged from the beginning that the sea would not cover the land everywhere. He describes the sea’s creation using the analogy of the birth of a living child, because water is especially suited to be changed into living things, which is why the seed of all things is moist. First, a child comes forth from its mother’s womb, which He refers to when He says, when it burst forth as though proceeding from the womb. He uses the word “burst forth” because it is a property of water to be in near-constant motion. He says the sea proceeds from the womb, not because it originated from other physical matter, but because it proceeded from the hidden origin of divine providence as from a womb. Second, a newborn child is dressed, and He expresses this by saying, when he laid out the clouds as its clothing. Since clouds are born from vapors released from water, they are much more numerous in maritime places. Third, a newborn child is wrapped in swaddling clothes, which He expresses by saying, and I wrapped it in fog like the swaddling clothes of an infant. The fog here does not mean water vapors raised or condensed into clouds, but the darkening of the air on the sea’s surface. Perhaps He alludes to what Genesis says: and darkness covered the face of the abyss (Genesis 1:2).

After presenting these things that express the primordial creation of the sea, He explains His conclusion, as if to say: When the sea was newly made, then, I surrounded it with my limits. He presents three things that pertain to the sea’s boundary. The first is shown when He says, within my limits, that is, those placed by Me. The second is when He says, I placed the bar, and the third when He says, and doors. These three things relate to the rule of divine power, and so He explains them this way: and I said: Thus far shall you come, which pertains to the nature of a boundary as the farthest extent of motion; and you will proceed no further, which pertains to the bar by which progress is blocked; and here shall your proud waves break. This pertains to the gates, which are placed not to allow random entrance or exit, but only according to a determined measure. Thus, the sea does not change its shore randomly, but according to the determined measure of the ebb and flow of its waves.

After the land and the water, He proceeds to the air, which, in appearance, is joined to heaven. The first condition common to the whole body that stretches over the waters and the land is the variation of night and day, which happens from the daily motion that is the first of all movements. Therefore, He asks, After your rising did you command the dawn? as if to say: Do day and night succeed each other on this earth by your command? For the dawn is a kind of boundary between day and night. He says, After your rising, just as when He spoke about the earth He had asked, Where were you? (Job 38:4).

For just as the earth is the first material principle of man, so the highest heaven, which varies night and day by its motion, is the first principle of the human body among physical causes. The clarity of daybreak is diversified according to the varying intensity of the signs that accompany the sun; when there are signs of a quick rising, the dawn lasts only a short time, but when the sun shows signs of a delayed rising, it endures longer. A measure of place is determined from which the brightness of daybreak begins to appear as the sun rises there. Expressing this, He then asks, and have you shown the dawn its place? as if to say: Have you ordered the places in the heavens from which the dawn will give its light? The implied answer is no. From all these things, you can understand that your reason falls short of comprehending divine things, and so it is clear that you are not suited to dispute with God.