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Psalms

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Psalm 107

1 Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, and his loyal love endures. 2 Let those delivered by the Lord speak out, those whom he delivered from the power of the enemy 3 and gathered from foreign lands, from east and west, from north and south. 4 They wandered through the wilderness, in a wasteland; they found no road to a city in which to live. 5 They were hungry and thirsty; they fainted from exhaustion. 6 They cried out to the Lord in their distress; he delivered them from their troubles. 7 He led them on a level road that they might find a city in which to live. 8 Let them give thanks to the Lord for his loyal love and for the amazing things he has done for people. 9 For he has satisfied those who thirst, and those who hunger he has filled with food. 10 They sat in utter darkness, bound in painful iron chains 11 because they had rebelled against God’s commands and rejected the instructions of the Most High. 12 So he used suffering to humble them; they stumbled and no one helped them up. 13 They cried out to the Lord in their distress; he delivered them from their troubles. 14 He brought them out of the utter darkness and tore off their shackles. 15 Let them give thanks to the Lord for his loyal love and for the amazing things he has done for people. 16 For he shattered the bronze gates and hacked through the iron bars. 17 They acted like fools in their rebellious ways and suffered because of their sins. 18 They lost their appetite for all food, and they drew near the gates of death. 19 They cried out to the Lord in their distress; he delivered them from their troubles. 20 He sent them an assuring word and healed them; he rescued them from the pits where they were trapped.⁠ 21 Let them give thanks to the Lord for his loyal love and for the amazing things he has done for people. 22 Let them present thank offerings, and loudly proclaim what he has done. 23 Some traveled on the sea in ships and carried cargo over the vast waters. 24 They witnessed the acts of the Lord, his amazing feats on the deep water. 25 He gave the order for a windstorm, and it stirred up the waves of the sea. 26 They reached up to the sky, then dropped into the depths. The sailors’ strength left them because the danger was so great. 27 They swayed and staggered like drunks, and all their skill proved ineffective. 28 They cried out to the Lord in their distress; he delivered them from their troubles. 29 He calmed the storm, and the waves grew silent. 30 The sailors rejoiced because the waves grew quiet, and he led them to the harbor they desired. 31 Let them give thanks to the Lord for his loyal love and for the amazing things he has done for people. 32 Let them exalt him in the assembly of the people. Let them praise him in the place where the leaders preside. 33 He turned streams into a desert, springs of water into arid land, 34 and a fruitful land into a barren place, because of the sin of its inhabitants. 35 As for his people, he turned a desert into a pool of water and a dry land into springs of water. 36 He allowed the hungry to settle there, and they established a city in which to live. 37 They cultivated fields and planted vineyards, which yielded a harvest of fruit. 38 He blessed them so that they became very numerous. He would not allow their cattle to decrease in number. 39 As for their enemies, they decreased in number and were beaten down, because of painful distress and suffering. 40 He would pour contempt upon princes, and he made them wander in a wasteland with no road.⁠ 41 Yet he protected the needy from oppression and cared for his families like a flock of sheep. 42 When the godly see this, they rejoice, and every sinner shuts his mouth. 43 Whoever is wise, let him take note of these things.⁠ Let them consider the Lord’s acts of loyal love.

Texts in conversation

Compare Psalm 107:40 and Job 12:21

Hebrew Bible

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Summary

Job 12 and Psalm 107 describe God overthrowing and humbling the powerful, but Job uses this language with irony rather than praise. The psalm praises divine justice that restores the oppressed, while Job highlights the unpredictability of divine power.

Passages

Psalm 107:40

Hebrew Bible
38 He blessed them so that they became very numerous. He would not allow their cattle to decrease in number. 39 As for their enemies, they decreased in number and were beaten down, because of painful distress and suffering. 40 He would pour contempt upon princes, and he made them wander in a wasteland with no road. 41 Yet he protected the needy from oppression and cared for his families like a flock of sheep. 42 When the godly see this, they rejoice, and every sinner shuts his mouth.
600–201 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Psalms

Job 12:21

Hebrew Bible
19 He leads priests away stripped and overthrows the potentates. 20 He deprives the trusted advisers of speech and takes away the discernment of elders. 21 He pours contempt on noblemen and disarms the powerful. 22 He reveals the deep things of darkness and brings deep shadows into the light. 23 He makes nations great and destroys them; he extends the boundaries of nations and disperses them. 24 He deprives the leaders of the earth of their understanding; he makes them wander in a trackless desert waste.
500–401 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Job

References

"... if “parody” in a given text is established, it should have the following features: (1) “the allusive imitation” of “the precursor text”; (2) the mocking, polemical, or attacking mode of the parodied text. Then, does the claim of Job’s parody over Psalms satisfy those conditions? Firstly, what one needs to confirm concerning “parody” is whether the corresponding author of Job intends to imitate the original work, i.e. specific texts within the Psalms. Will Kynes, for instance, argues that the author of Job 12:21, 24 parodies Psalm 107:40 to mock Eliphaz’s speech. Although part of Job 12 is similar to Psalm 107:40, one may not deny another possibility: both texts may depend on a shared hymn and (more reasonably) Job 12:13–25 sarcastically responds to Job 5:17–26, where Eliphaz states that the one whom God reproves will be delivered and blessed. Essentially, it is more realistic to view such similarities of Job with psalmic texts as the spread of a broad intellectual network in its compositional period rather than as a quotation, an allusion, or an echo in a narrow sense. If the author of Job borrows from Psalm 107, the form of hymn poetry that people generally recognize at the time should be strengthened in its given dialogue of Job 12. However, Job 12:13–24, in general, highlights that the destructive power of the divinity dismantles the power and wisdom of political governors and leaders of all nations without any purpose ..."
JiSeong J. Kwon, “Not Parody, but Irony: Irony in the Book of Job,” in Irony in the Bible: Between Subversion and Innovation, ed. Tobias Häner, Virginia Miller, and Carolyn J. Sharp (Leiden: Brill, 2023), 114–131.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Psalm 107:40 and Job 12:21

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