Texts in Conversation
Isaiah 44 portrays God stretching out the sky like a fabric and forming the earth, imagery that reflects ancient Near Eastern cosmology in which the heavens were viewed as a solid dome spread over the world. Job echoes this same description, using it to highlight divine power over creation.
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Isaiah 44:24
Hebrew Bible
23 Shout for joy, O sky, for the Lord intervenes; shout out, you subterranean regions of the earth. O mountains, give a joyful shout; you too, O forest and all your trees! For the Lord protects Jacob; he reveals his splendor through Israel. 24 This is what the Lord, your Protector, says, the one who formed you in the womb: “I am the Lord, who made everything, who alone stretched out the sky, who fashioned the earth all by myself, 25 who frustrates the omens of the empty talkers and humiliates the omen readers, who overturns the counsel of the wise men and makes their advice seem foolish, 26 who fulfills the oracles of his prophetic servants and brings to pass the announcements of his messengers, who says about Jerusalem, ‘She will be inhabited,’ and about the towns of Judah, ‘They will be rebuilt, her ruins I will raise up,’
Date: 7th-5th Centuries B.C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
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Job 9:8
Hebrew Bible
6 he who shakes the earth out of its place so that its pillars tremble, 7 he who commands the sun, and it does not shine and seals up the stars, 8 he alone spreads out the heavens and treads on the waves of the sea. 9 He makes the Bear, Orion, and the Pleiades, and the constellations of the southern sky; 10 he does great and unsearchable things, and wonderful things without number.
Date: 5th Century B.C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... This same dialogical interpretation occurs in allusions to other psalms in Job, as well as to Isaiah 40–55, though with this text the technique is not quite as pronounced. Here, briefly, are four examples. These possible allusions are not the strongest between the two texts, and, in fact, it must be admitted that they could be coincidental or even shared references to a common source. However, if one concedes that Job is alluding to Isaiah 40–55 in the stronger cases (e.g. Job 12:9 / Isaiah 41:20 and the group of parallels concentrated in Job 9:2–12 ... Job 9:4, Isaiah 40:26; Job 9:8, Isaiah 44:24; Job 9:10, Isaiah 40:28; Job 9:12, Isaiah 34:13), as does even Brinks-Rea, who believes such claims are often exaggerated, then the Job poet’s evident knowledge of some form of Isaiah 40–55 legitimates the search for further allusions which may be weaker. As Robert Alter observes, “allusions often radiate out to contiguous allusions.” ..."
Kynes, Will
"Job and Isaiah 40-55: Intertextualities in Dialogue" in Dell, Katharine Julia, and Will Kynes (eds.) Reading Job Intertextually
(pp. 94-105) Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2013
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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