Discovery BoxJob 38:31-41 
Context38:31 Can you tie the bands 1 of the Pleiades,
or release the cords of Orion?
38:32 Can you lead out
the constellations 2 in their seasons,
or guide the Bear with its cubs? 3
38:33 Do you know the laws of the heavens,
or can you set up their rule over the earth?
38:34 Can you raise your voice to the clouds
so that a flood of water covers you? 4
38:35 Can you send out lightning bolts, and they go?
Will they say to you, ‘Here we are’?
38:36 Who has put wisdom in the heart, 5
or has imparted understanding to the mind?
38:37 Who by wisdom can count the clouds,
and who can tip over 6 the water jars of heaven,
38:38 when the dust hardens 7 into a mass,
and the clumps of earth stick together?
38:39 “Do you hunt prey for the lioness,
and satisfy the appetite 8 of the lions,
38:40 when they crouch in their dens,
when they wait in ambush in the thicket?
38:41 Who prepares prey for the raven,
when its young cry out to God
and wander about 9 for lack of food?
1 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 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.”
4 tc The LXX has “answer you,” and some editors have adopted this. However, the reading of the MT makes better sense in the verse.
5 tn This verse is difficult because of the two words, טֻחוֹת (tukhot, rendered here “heart”) and שֶׂכְוִי (sekhvi, here “mind”). They have been translated a number of ways: “meteor” and “celestial appearance”; the stars “Procyon” and “Sirius”; “inward part” and “mind”; even as birds, “ibis” and “cock.” One expects them to have something to do with nature – clouds and the like. The RSV accordingly took them to mean “meteor” (from a verb “to wander”) and “a celestial appearance.” But these meanings are not well-attested.
6 tn The word actually means “to cause to lie down.”
7 tn The word means “to flow” or “to cast” (as in casting metals). So the noun developed the sense of “hard,” as in cast metal.
8 tn Heb “fill up the life of.”
9 tn The verse is difficult, making some suspect that a line has dropped out. The little birds in the nest hardly go wandering about looking for food. Dhorme suggest “and stagger for lack of food.”
