Attributed commentary excerpt
Keil & Delitzsch on Job 39:13
A historical reference excerpt for this verse. Read it alongside the biblical text and other available sources.
Commentary on the Old Testament
C. F. Keil & F. Delitzsch · 19th-century historical commentary
Source: BibleWord.ai's local reference edition of this named work.
13 The wing of the ostrich vibrates joyously, Is she pious, wing and feather? 14 No, she leaveth her eggs in the earth And broodeth over the dust, 15 Forgetting that a foot may crush them, And the beast of the field trample them. 16 She treateth her young ones harshly as if they were not hers; In vain is her labour, without her being distressed. 17 For Eloah hath caused her to forget wisdom, And gave her no share of understanding. 18 At the time when she lasheth herself aloft, She derideth the horse and horseman. As the wild ass and the ox-like oryx cannot be tamed by man, and employed in his service like the domestic ass and ox, so the ostrich, although resembling the stork in its stilt-like structure, the colour of its feathers, and its gregarious life, still has characteristics totally different from those one ought to look for according to this similarity. רננים, a wail, prop. a tremulous shrill sound (vid., Job 39:23), is a name of the female ostrich, whose peculiar cry is called in Arabic zimâr (זמר). נעלס (from עלס, which in comparison with עלץ, עלז, rarely occurs) signifies to make gestures of joy. אם, Job 39:13, is an interrogative an; חסידה, pia, is a play upon the name of the stork, which is so called: pia instar ciconiae (on this figure of speech, comp. Mehren's Rehtorik der Araber, S. 178). כּי, Job 39:14, establishes the negation implied in the question, as e.g., Isa 28:28. The idea is not that the hen-ostrich abandons the hatching of her eggs to the earth (עזב ל as Psa 16:10), and makes them "glow over the dust" (Schlottm.), for the maturing energy compensating for the sitting of the parent bird proceeds from the sun's heat, which ought to have been mentioned; one would also expect a Hiph. instead of the Piel תּחמּם, which can be understood only of hatching by her own warmth. The hen-ostrich also really broods herself, although from time to time she abandons the חמּם to the sun. (Note: It does, however, as it appears, actually occur, that the female leaves the work of hatching to the sun by day, and to the male at night, and does not sit at all herself; vid., Funke's Naturgeschichte, revised by Taschenberg (1864), S. 243f.) That which contrasts with the φιλοστοργία of the stork, which is here made prominent, is that she lays here eggs in a hole in the ground, and partly, when the nest is full, above round about it, while חסידה ברושׁים ביתה, Psa 104:17. רננים is construed in accordance with its meaning as fem. sing., Ew. 318, a. Since she acts thus, what next happens consistently therewith is told by the not aoristic but only consecutive ותּשׁכּח: and so she forgets that the foot may crush (זוּר, to press together, break by pressure, as הזּוּרה, Isa 59:5 = הזּוּרה, that which is crushed, comp. לנה = לנה, Zac 5:4) them (i.e., the eggs, Ges. 146, 3), and the beast of the field may trample them down, crush them (דּוּשׁ as Arab. dâs, to crush by treading upon anything, to tread out). Job 39:16 The difficulty of הקשׁיח (from קשׁח, Arab. qsḥ, hardened from קשׁה, Arab. qsâ) being used of the hen-ostrich in the masc., may be removed by the pointing הקשׁיח (Ew.); but this alteration is unnecessary, since the Hebr. also uses the masc. for the fem. where it might be regarded as impossible (vid., Job 39:3, and comp. e.g., Isa 32:11.). Jer. translates correctly according to the sense: quasi non sint sui, but ל is not directly equivalent to כּ; what is meant is, that by the harshness of her conduct she treats her young as not be…
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