Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Job 28:17

The gold and the crystal cannot equal it: and the exchange of it [shall not be for] jewels of fine gold.

17. and the crystal ] Probably glass, which was rare and counted precious in ancient times.

cannot equal it ] The word means to arrange, to set over against, to compare with. The idea here is that gold and glass cannot be set against Wisdom by way of barter, as the next clause distinctly states.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

The gold and the crystal – A crystal, in chemistry, is an inorganic body which, by the operation of affinity, has assumed the form of a regular solid, terminated by a number of plane and smooth surfaces. It is round in various forms and sizes, and is composed of a great variety of substances. The common rock crystal is a general name for all the transparent crystals of quartz, particularly of limpid or colorless quartz. Webster. The word used here ( z^ekukyth) occurs nowhere else in the Bible. It is from zakah, to be clean, pure; and is given to the crystal on account of its transparency. In Arabic the word means either glass or crystal. Jerome translates it, vitrum – glass; the Septuagint hualos – crystal, or the lapis crystallinus. Hesychius says that the crystal denotes lampron kruos – clear ice or, lithon timion – a precious stone. There is no reason to suppose that glass was known so early as this, and the probability is that the word here denotes something like the rock crystal, having a strong resemblance to the diamond, and perhaps then regarded as nearly of equal value. It cannot be supposed that the relative value of gems was then understood as it is now.

Jewels of fine gold – Margin, vessels. The Hebrew word k^ely properly means vessels, or instruments. It may refer here, however, to ornaments for the person, as it was in that way chiefly that gold was employed.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Job 28:17

And the crystal cannot equal it.

The crystal exact

In the first place I remark that religion is superior to the crystal in exactness. That shapeless mass of crystal against which you accidentally dashed your foot is laid out with more exactness than any earthly city. There are six styles of crystallisation, and all of them divinely ordained. Every crystal has mathematical precision. Gods geometry reaches through it, and it is a square, or it is a rectangle, or it is a rhomboid or, in some way, it hath a mathematical figure. Now religion beats that in the simple fact that spiritual accuracy is more beautiful than material accuracy. Gods attributes are exact. Gods law exact. Gods decrees exact. Gods management of the world exact. Never counting wrong, though He counts the grass blades and the stars, and the sands and the cycles. His providences never dealing with us perpendicularly when those providences ought to be oblique, nor lateral when they ought to be vertical. Everything in our life arranged without any possibility of mistake. Each life a six-sided prism. Born at the right time; dying at the right time. There are no happen-sos in our theology. If I thought this was a slipshod universe I would go crazy. God is not an anarchist. Law, order, symmetry, precision. A perfect square. A perfect rectangle. A perfect rhomboid. A perfect circle. The edge of Gods robe of government never frays out. There are no loose screws in the worlds machinery. It did not just happen that Napoleon was attacked with indigestion at Borodino, so that he became incompetent for the day. It did not just happen that John Thomas, the missionary, on a heathen island, waiting for an outfit and orders for another missionary tour, received that outfit and those orders in a box that floated ashore, while the ship and the crew that carried the box were never heard of. The barking of F.W. Robertsons dog, he tells us, led to a line of events which brought him from the army into the Christian ministry, where he served God with world-renowned usefulness. It did not merely happen so. I believe in a particular Providence. I believe Gods geometry may be seen in all our life more beautifully than in crystallography. Job was right. The crystal cannot equal it. (T. De Witt Talmage.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 17. See Clarke on Job 28:16.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

The crystal; or, amber, which in those parts was of very great price; or, the diamond. The Hebrew word is not elsewhere used, and it hath in it the signification of purity, or clearness, or brightness.

Jewels; or, vessels; wherein there is not only the excellency of the materials, but the curiosity of art, which renders the other much more valuable.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

17. crystalOr else glass, ifthen known, very costly. From a root, “to be transparent.”

jewelsrather,”vessels.”

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

The gold and the crystal cannot equal it,…. Crystal was found in an island of the Red sea, situated before Arabia, called Neron, and in another, which from a gem found in it bears the name of Topazion, and may be thought therefore to be well known by Job; and though it is not now of so much account, it formerly was very valuable. Pliny a makes mention of a crystal vessel, sold for 150,000 sesterces, about 1250 pounds sterling; and of two crystal cups broke by Nero in his fury, on hearing of some losses, to punish the then present age, that no other men might drink out of them: some render it “amber”, which is found in Prussia, and being at a great distance from Job’s country, might be the more valuable there; and Pliny b speaks of it as had in as great esteem as gems: the Septuagint, Vulgate Latin versions, and others, translate it “glass” c which had its original from Phoenicia, near Judea; so Pliny says d from the lake Cendevia, within the roots of Mount Carmel, in Phoenicia, near Judea, springs the river Belus, from whence glass came first; and he speaks of Sidon (a city in Phoenicia) as famous for it; and Tacitus e observes, that the river Belus glides in the Jewish sea, and about the mouth of it sand is gathered and mixed with nitre, and boiled into glass; and this being near the country where Job dwelt, it is thought be had knowledge of it; and from this passage some f have concluded the great antiquity of glass; and if it is true what Aelianus g relates, that when the monument of the ancient Belus (the first king of Babylon) was dug up by Xerxes, the son of Darius, that there was found a glass urn, where lay a body in oil, it must be in use before the times of Job. An Arabic chronologer h affirms what be had from men conversant in history, that in Egypt, after the flood, there were men learned in various sciences, and among the rest in alchemy, and had knowledge of burning glasses; though the invention of these, and of a glass globe, is ascribed to Archimedes i, who lived somewhat later than two hundred years before Christ. There was great plenty of glass very early in Ethiopia, after mentioned, in which they enclosed their dead, that they might be seen through it k; and if it was in use in Job’s time, and especially if it was then a late invention, it might be highly valued, and therefore placed here with things of the greatest worth. In the times of Nero, Pliny says l two small glass cups were sold for six thousand sesterces, or forty five pounds sterling, and according to others near fifty pounds; and the same writer relates, that in the times of Tiberias an art was found out to make glass flexible and malleable; but was ordered to be destroyed, lest the value of gold, silver, and brass, should be lessened by it. The Targum renders the word here used a looking glass; [See comments on Jos 11:8]. Some think the diamond or adamant is meant, and others that it is a general name for all sorts of precious stones, they being clear, transparent, and lucid, as the word signifies:

and the exchange of it [shall not be for] jewels of fine gold; set in fine gold; or “vessels” of it, more valuable than gold itself, being made of gold, purified, refined, and wrought by art into curious forms; and yet wisdom is so valuable as not to be exchanged for these. Mr. Broughton takes this fine gold, or gold of Phaz, to be the same with Fess in Barbary, which had its name from a heap of gold there found when its foundation was laid; for “fess” with the Arabs signifies gold m.

a Ut supra, (Nat. Hist. l. 37.) c. 2. b Ib. c. 5. c , Sept. “vitrum”, V. L. Tigurine version, Cocceius. d Ut supra, (Nat. Hist.) l. 36. c. 26. Joseph. de Bello Jud. l. 2. c. 10. sect. 2. e Hist. l. 5. c. 7. f Neri Praefat. ad. lib. de re vitriaria. g Var. Hist. l. 12. c. 3. h Abulpharag. Hist. Dynast. p. 33. i Vid. Fabritii Bibliothec. Gr. l. 3. c. 22. sect. 11. 15. k Diodor. Sic. l. 2. p. 102. Herodot. Thalia, sive, l. 3. c. 24. l Ut supra. (Nat. Hist. l. 36. c. 26.) m Leo African. Descript. Africae, l. 3. p. 273.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

17 Gold and glass are not equal to it,

Nor is it exchanged for jewels of gold.

18 Pearls and crystal are not to be mentioned,

And the acquisition of wisdom is beyond corals.

19 The topaz of Ethiopia is not equal to it,

It is not outweighed by pure fine gold.

20 Whence, then, cometh wisdom,

And which is the place of understanding?

Among the separate , Pro 3:15, which are here detailed, apart from , glass has the transparent name , or, as it is pointed in Codd., in old editions, and by Kimchi, , with Cholem (in the dialects with instead of ) . Symm. indeed translates crystal, and in fact the ancient languages have common names for glass and crystal; but the crystal is here called , which signifies prop., like the Arab. ‘gibs , ice ; also signifies prop. ice, and this only in Homer, then crystal, exactly as the cognate unites both significations in itself. The reason of this homonymy lies deeper than in the outward similarity, – the ancients really thought the crystal was a product of the cold; Pliny, xxxvii. 2, 9, says: non alibi certe reperitur quam ubi maxume hibernae nives rigent, glaciemque esse certum est, unde nomen Graeci dedere . The Targ. translates by , certainly in the sense of the Arabico-Persic bullur ( bulur ), which signifies crystal, or even glass, and moreover is the primary word for , although the identical Sanskrit word, according to the laws of sound, vaidurja (Pali, velurija ), is, according to the lexicons, a name of the lapis lazuli (Persic, lagurd ). Of the two words and , the one appears to mean pearls and the other corals; the ancient appellations of these precious things which belong to the sea are also blended; the Persic mergan (Sanskr. mangara ) unites the signification pearl and coral in itself. The root , Arab. f n , which has the primary notion of pushing, especially of vegetation (whence Arab. fann , a branch, shoot, prop. motion; French, jet ), and Lam 4:7, where snow and milk, as figures of whiteness (purity), are placed in contrast with as a figure of redness, favour the signification corals for . The Coptic be noni , which signifies gemma , favours (so far as it may be compared) corals rather than pearls. And the fact that , Eze 27:16, appears as an Aramaean article of commerce in the market of Tyre, is more favourable to the signification pearls than corals; for the Babylonians sailed far into the Indian Ocean, and brought pearls from the fisheries of Bahrein, perhaps even from Ceylon, into the home markets (vid., Layard, New Discoveries, 536). The name is perhaps, from the Western Asiatic name of the pearl,

(Note: Vid., Zeitschr. fr d. Kunde des Morgenlandes, iv. 40f. The recently attempted explanation of from (to which the rather belongs), in the primary signification lappillus (Arab. garal ), is without support.)

mutilated and Hebraized.

(Note: Two reasons for = pearls (in favour of which Bochart compares the name of the pearl-oyster, ) and = corals, which are maintained by Carey, are worthy of remark. (1.) That does not signify corals, he infers from Lam 4:7, for the redness of corals cannot be a mark of bodily beauty; “but when I find that there are some pearls of a slightly reddish tinge, then I can understand and appreciate the comparison.” (2.) That signifies corals, is shown by the origin of the word, which properly signifies reem -(wild oxen) horns, which is favoured by a mention of Pliny, h. n. xiii. 51: ( Tradidere ) juncos quoque lapideos perquam similes veris per litora, et in alto quasdam arbusculas colore bubuli cornus ramosas et cacuminibus rubentes . Although Pliny there speaks of marine petrified plants of the Indian Ocean (not, at least in his sense, of corals), this hint of a possible derivation of is certainly surprising. But as to Lam 4:7, this passage is to be understood according to Son 5:10 (my friend is ). The white and red are intended to be conceived of as mixed and overlapping one another, as our Germ. popular poetry speaks of cheeks which “shine with milk and purple;” and as in Homer, Il. iv. 141-146, the colour of the beautifully formed limbs of Menelaus is represented by the figure (which appears hideous to us): (ebony stained with purple).)

The name of the of Ethiopia appears to be derived from to’paz by transposition; Pliny says of the topaz, xxxvii. 8, 32, among other passages; Juba Topazum insulam in rubro mari a continenti stadiis CCC abesse dicit, nebulosam et ideo quaesitam saepius navigantibus; ex ea causa nomen accepisse: topazin enim Troglodytarum lingua significationem habere quaerendi . This topaz, however, which is said to be named after an island of the same name, the Isle of Serpents in Agatharchides and Diodorus, is, according to Pliny, yellowish green, and therefore distinct from the otherwise so-called topaz. To make a candid confession, we grope about everywhere in the dark here, and the ancient versions are not able to help us out of our difficulty.

(Note: The Targ. translates by , ; by (Arab. sbz, vid., Pott in the Zeitschr.f. K. d. M. iv. 275); by , ; by , , red gold-pigment (vid., Rdiger-Pott, as just quoted, S. 267); again by in the sense of the Arabico-Persic bullur , Kurd. bellur , crystal; by , ; by (the green pearl); by (perhaps , , in the sense of lamina auri ).)

The poet lays everything under contribution to illustrate the thought, that the worth of wisdom exceeds the worth of the most valuable earthly thing; besides which, in , “the acquisition or possession (from , Arab. msk , to draw to one’s self, to take hold of) of wisdom is above corals,” there is an indication that, although not by the precious things of the earth, still in some way or other, wisdom can be possessed, so that consequently the question repeated at the end of the strophe will not remain unanswered. This is its meaning: now if wisdom is not to be found in any of the places named, and is not to be attained by any of the means mentioned, whence can man hope to attain it, and whither must he turn to find it? for its existence is certain, and it is an indisputable need of man that he should partake of it.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

(17) The exchange of it.Or, according to some, the attraction of it. The remainder of this chapter calls for little remark: its unrivalled sublimity is patent, and comment is superfluous. There is a general resemblance between this chapter and Proverbs 8, and both seem to imply a knowledge of the Mosaic narrative of creation.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

17. Crystal Probably glass. The manufacture of glass is of great antiquity, as is evident from the paintings at Beni Hassan, of more than 3,800 years ago, which still represent the process of glass-blowing. The Egyptians had the secret of introducing gold between layers of glass; also of working Mosaic in glass of so delicate a pattern as to have required the use of a magnifying lens. (WILKINSON, P.A., 2:61.) Glass perfectly transparent was esteemed of extremely high value. Nero is said, according to Carey, to have purchased two glass cups with handles for a sum equivalent to 50,000 pounds sterling.

Jewels Vessels.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments