292}
their faces covered with dust and ashes. And if God has not done this
terrible deed, who has done it?
And Job rebels against such a state of things
"34. Let him take his _rod away from me_, and let not his fear
terrify me.
"35. Then I would speak to him and not fear him but it is not so with
me."
What rod--what fear? Surely not the mere physical affliction which is
popularly supposed to have constituted Job's chief grievance. Is the
"rod" that terrifies Job so that he fears to speak, that great object
which cleft the heavens; that curved wolf-jaw of the Goths, one end
of which rested on the earth while the other touched the sun? Is it
the great sword of Surt?
And here we have another (chap. x) allusion to the "darkness,"
although in our version it is applied to death:
"21. Before I go whence I shall not return, even to the land of
darkness and the shadow of death.
"22. A _land of darkness_ as darkness itself, and of the shadow of
death, _without any order_, and _where the light is as darkness_."
Or, as the Douay version has it:
"21.
Pages:
393
394
395
396
397
398
399
400
401
402
403
404
405
406
407
408
409
410
411
412
413
414
415
416
417