Or speak to the earth, and it will teach you. The fish of the sea will declare to you.
Parallel Translations
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Or speak to the earth, and it will teach you. The fish of the sea will declare to you.
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Or speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee: and the fishes of the sea shall declare unto thee.
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Or speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee; and the fishes of the sea shall declare unto thee;
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John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Job 12:8 Or speak to the earth, and it…
Job 12:8 Or speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee: and the fishes of the sea shall declare unto thee.
Ver. 8. Or speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee] Teach thee? what? Surely many good lessons; as that of humility and modesty, considering our origin, Terra quam terimus docet terram quam gerimus; that of fruitfulness, while she liberally yields her riches and strength, and brings forth food for the maintenance of those innumerable armies of creatures that live upon her; but especially, and for the purpose, this the earth teacheth, that the tabernacles of robbers prosper, that oppressors swallow down most of her delicates, eat the fat and drink the sweet, ruffle in her silks, and rifle in her hidden treasures of gold and silver.
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And the fishes of the sea shall declare unto thee] These muti magistri silent teachers, have somewhat also to say to thee, and by a dumb kind of eloquence read thee a divinity lecture, while they are able to produce many such particular examples of violence in the seas; and will further declare (or cipher up unto thee) how oft they are served up to great men’s tables, and do fill the fat paunches of oppressors. It is not unlikely that Job, in this frequent sending Zophar to school to the unreasonable and inanimate creatures, closely twitteth him with those quicker questions of his, Job 11:8, "What canst thou do? what canst thou know?" &c., giving him also to know that he need not travel as far as heaven or hell for instances of God’s infinite power and wisdom, since we may contemplate the footsteps of God in each creature; and since he is so near unto us that he may be almost felt with our hands, as Paul speaketh (ψηλαφησειαν), Act 17:27.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Who knoweth not in all these,.... Or "by" or…
Who knoweth not in all these,.... Or "by" or "from all these" (o) creatures; what man is there so stupid and senseless, that does not discern, or cannot learn, even from irrational creatures, the above things, even what Zophar had discoursed concerning God and his perfections, his power, wisdom and providence? for, by the things that are made, the invisible things of God are clearly seen and understood, even his eternal power and Godhead, Rom 1:20; particularly it may be known by these, and who is it that does not know thereby,
that the hand of the Lord hath wrought this? made this visible world, and all things in it, to which Job then pointed as it were with his finger, meaning the heavens, earth, and sea, and all that in them are, which were all created by him: hence he is called the Former and Maker of all things; and which are all the works of his hand, that is, of his power, which is meant by his hand, that being the instrument of action. This is the only place where the word "Jehovah" is used in this book by the disputants.
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(o) "ex omnibus istis", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Schmidt, Schultens, Michaelis; "per omnia haec", Cocceius; so Broughton.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain Or speak to the earth, and it shall teach…
Or speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee - Perhaps this appeal to the earth may mean, as Stuhlman supposes, that the same thing is shown in the productions of the earth, as in the case of fierce animals. Noxious weeds and useless plants are more thrifty than the plants which are useful and the growth of poisonous or annoying things on the earth illustrates the same thing as the dealings of God with people - that his dealings are not in accordance with the real nature of objects.
And the fishes of the sea - The same thing is manifested in the sea, where the mighty prey upon the feeble, and the fierce and the ferocious overcome the defenseless. The sentiment is that it is a great principle which pervades all things that the ferocious the strong, the wicked, are often prospered, while the weak, the defenseless, the innocent, the pious, are subject to calamities, and that God does not apportion his dealings to the exact character of his creatures. Undoubtedly Job was right in this. and this general principle might be seen then as now, to pervade the world.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain speak to the earth--rather, "the shrubs of the earth"…
speak to the earth--rather, "the shrubs of the earth" [UMBREIT].
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 8. Speak to the earth — That is, to…
8. Speak to the earth — That is, to “every creeping thing” (Gen_1:30) which is on the earth. The division of animate creation is the same and in the same order as in Gen_9:2. Beasts, birds, creeping things, fishes. The downward gradation, closing with the fish, probably the least intelligent of all, admirably chimes in with Job’s strain of irony.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 8. speak to the earth] The “earth” here includes…
8. speak to the earth] The “earth” here includes all the forms of lower life with which it teems.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain Or speak to the earth, and it shall teach…
Or speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee. If the material earth be intended, the appeal must be to its orderly course, its summers and winters, its seedtime and harvest, its former and latter rains, its constant productivity, which, no less than animal instincts, speak of a single ruling power directing and ordering all things. If the creeping things of the earth, the reptile creation, be meant, then the argument is merely an expansion of that in the preceding verse. The instincts of reptiles are to be ascribed, no less than those of beasts and birds, to the constant superintending action and providence of the Almighty. And the fishes of the sea shall declare unto thee. The testimony will be unanimous beasts, birds, reptiles, and fishes will unite in it.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain Speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee.
Job_12:8
Speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee.
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The teaching of the earth
To the attentive ear all the earth is eloquent; to the reflecting mind all nature is symbolical. Each object has a voice which reaches the inner ear, and speaks lessons of wise and solemn import. The stream murmurs unceasingly its secrets; Sibylline breeze in mountain glens and in lonely forests sighs forth its oracles. The face of nature is everywhere written over with Divine characters which he who runs may read. But beside the more obvious lessons which lie as it were on the surface of the earth, and which suggest themselves to us often when least disposed for inquiry or reflection, there are more recondite lessons which she teaches to those who make her structure and arrangements their special study, and who penetrate to her secret arcana. She has loud tones for the careless and superficial, and low suggestive whispers to those who hear with an instructed and attentive mind. And those who read her great volume, admiring with the poet and lover of nature the richly-coloured and elaborate frontispieces and illustrations, but not arrested by these--passing on, leaf after leaf, to the quiet and sober chapters of the interior--will find in these internal details revelations of the deepest interest. As we step over the threshold, and penetrate into the inner chambers of natures temple, we may leave behind us the beauty of the gardens and ornamented parterres; but we shall find new objects to compensate us: cartoons more wonderful than those of Raphael adorning the walls; friezes grander than those of the Parthenon; sculptures more awe-inspiring than those which have been disinterred from the temples of Karnak and Assyria. In descending into the crust of the earth, we lose sight of the rich robe of vegetation which adorns the surface, the beauties of tree and flower, forest, hill, and river, and the ever-changing splendours of the sky; but we shall observe enough to make up for it all in the extraordinary relics of ancient worlds, strewn around us and beneath our feet. This lesson which the earth teaches, it may be said, is a very sombre and depressing one. True in one sense; but it is also very salutary. Besides, there is consolation mingled with it. The teaching of the earth does not leave man humbled and prostrated. While it casts down his haughty and unwarrantable pretensions, it also enkindles aspirations of the noblest kind. While it shows to him the shortness of his pedigree, it also reveals to him the greatness of his destiny. It declares most distinctly, that the present creation exceeds all the prior creations of which the different strata of the earth bear testimony, and that the human race occupies the foremost place among terrestrial creatures. It teaches unmistakably that there has been a gradual course of preparation for the present epoch--that all the time worlds of the past are satellites of the human period. There are a thousand evidences of this in the nature and arrangement of the earths materials, so clear and obvious that it is impossible to misunderstand them. The nature of the soil on the surface; the value, abundance, and accessibility of the metals and minerals beneath; the arrangement of the various strata of rock into mountain and valley, river and ocean bed: all these circumstances, which have had a powerful influence in determining the settlement, the history, and the character of the human race, were not fortuitous--left to the wild, passionate caprices of nature--but have been subjected to law and compelled to subserve the interests of humanity. The carboniferous strata themselves, their geographical range, and the mode in which they have been made accessible and workable by volcanic eruptions, clearly evince a controlling power--a designing purpose wisely and benevolently preparing for mans comfortable and useful occupancy of the earth. Some object that the teaching of the earth is delusive and uncertain. This opinion is fostered by the varied, and, in many cases, conflicting readings and interpretations of the geological record. Theories have been formed which more advanced knowledge has demonstrated to be false and untenable; and these hasty conclusions have tended in some measure to throw discredit upon the whole study, by giving it a vague appearance. It was to have been expected beforehand that a science, offering such great temptations to speculation, so flesh and young and buoyant, with such boundless fields for roaming before her, would have been excited to some extent by the vagaries of fancy, and that individuals on the slenderest data would build up the most elaborate structures. But geology, upon the whole, has been less encumbered with these than perhaps any other science; and the researches of its students have been conducted in a singularly calm and philosophical spirit. Every step has been deliberately taken; every acquisition made to its domains has been carefully surveyed; and hence, we are at this moment in possession of a mass of observations which, considering the very recent origin of the science, is truly astonishing, and which is entitled to the utmost confidence. Furthermore, the teaching of the earth is not irreligious--is not calculated to undermine our faith in the inspiration of the Bible, and to nurture infidel propensities. This objection has been frequently brought against it, and urged with vehemence and rancour; and a feeling of repulsion, a strong and unreasonable prejudice, has in consequence been raised against it in the minds of many pious and estimable individuals. They look upon the science with dread, and place the study of it in the same category with that of the blasphemous dogmas of the Rational School. I believe that a careful study of the leading works, and accumulated facts of geology, by any candid, unbiassed mind, will result in the conviction that nothing connected with the progress of science has ever yet truly infringed the integrity of revelation. (Hugh Macmillan, D. D.)
The Gospel of nature
And what on Jobs lips was irony and taunt stands for something totally different to many of you. You have come from the great cities where you know the world, but not the earth, and you wish that here earth and sea would teach you some secret of mental renewal and physical recuperation. And the more devout among you will wish that you might speak to the earth and it might teach you of the great and eternal God. Such teaching would be in harmony with many of the passages in the Old Testament. It is true that, except in the Song of Songs, with its vineyards a-blossom and a-bud, with its gardens astir with fragrance, and with its streams that flow from Lebanon, the Old Testament reveals little feeling for scenery as scenery. But right through all its books there is an evident appreciation of earth and sea and mountains and stars, as revealing the greatness of the Creator. The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth His handiwork. He gathereth the waters of the sea together as an heap. The sea is His and He made it. From such sayings as these you can learn how good men stood amazed in the midst of creation, and strained reverent eyes towards the High and Lofty One who inhabiteth eternity. There are those on both sides who speak as though religion and science are set in eternal antagonism, and too often the laboratory is regarded as the natural enemy of the temple. But as a matter of fact, science is really a side chapel in the great cathedral of humanity, upbuilt by the reverence and worship of the world. The most capable man of science is the man who is best endowed with capacity for thinking Gods thoughts after Him. And the more we learn of the wonders of creation, the greater the marvel of Him who created and sustains. Hence it comes to pass that whatever the scientist may say, science itself makes for an intensifying of religion. It would seem, then, that if we speak to the earth it can teach us something about religion. The shimmering sea, the bold black rocks, the sun flooding headland and sands with a searching splendour can tell us of the greatness and power of Him who conceived, created, and sustains the marvel of their appearing. Nature is the garment of God. So far, then, the beginnings of a religion. But man is so made that he wants more than the garment of the Divine. The robe is magnificent, but what of the heart that beats beneath? After Solomon was dead there grew up a legend that his regal garments shrouded a heart of fire. Do the fires that glow at the earth centre represent the heart of God, or where may we turn for our revelation? A religion begins when men learn something, anything, about God. But a Gospel only begins when men learn about His heart. And there is no original Gospel of nature. But to begin with, all that the earth shows you is a God of power and wisdom. Now, the important thing in a revelation of God is not simply that you know Him, but the character of the God that you know. It were better, perhaps, for men not to be aware of a God who is less than righteousness and love. And the only God that nature shows you is a personification of energy and wisdom Further, much that might seem informing in nature concerning God would be absolutely misleading. There is one side of the world process that Tennyson speaks of as Nature red in tooth and claw. By that he means that one part of the animal creation lives on the other. The tiger rends the fawn, and the pike will feed on the smaller fish. Is God, then, callous to cruelty? We cannot believe that He is. Yet it is something beyond nature that teaches us to trust there is some hidden meaning in all this that at present we do not see. But, mind you, we dare to hope this because we know something of the heart of God. We do not learn it from nature. Not all the cold heights of the snow-crowned Alps, and not all the deeps of the big blue sea could have taught us this. They could give us the beginnings of a religion. But heart cries to heart, and your heart wants to know about the heart of the Eternal. It is knowledge of the heart of God that makes a Gospel. And you must turn elsewhere fox that. And to where shall you turn? Where, indeed, save to the Christ? True Christianity is an exposition of a Personality, and the Personality of Christ was an expression of the heart of God. Therefore, it is to Him that you must look when you are in search of a Gospel. And once you have found a Gospel in Christ, then you may find a Gospel in nature. And how? Job says, Speak to the earth., and it shall teach thee. We have seen that he was right in so far as we ask the earth to teach us of the wisdom and power of God. But it has no original message beyond that. It is echo and not originality that enables it to speak forth a Gospel. In the matter of the higher phases of religion, nature gives to you essentially what you first give her. She intensifies, glorifies, clarifies what you know already of the heart of God, but she cannot originate a Gospel. For proof of the fact that you only get from nature in the spiritual sphere what you first give to her, you have only to think of her varying interpretation in the minds of different men. Take, for example, say Wordsworth and Matthew Arnold. Arnold was a Stoic, born out of due time, and so he found in nature what was first shown him in his shadowed heart. He tells us himself how he looked out on the beach at Dover when the night was calm, and the full, spacious tide was flooded with moonlight. Most of us at such an hour would have gazed, subdued to tranquillity. But Arnold heard the shifting pebbles grating on the shore, and the tremulous cadence of the waves brought for him
The eternal note of sadness in.
And where Wordsworth would have felt that the goodness of God was rimming a world with the glory of a heavenly light, he only thought with Sophocles of the turbid ebb and flow of human misery. And to him the outgoing tide represented the receding of the sea of faith, and he only heard--
Its melancholy long-withdrawing roar,
Retreating to the breath
Of the night wind, down the vast edge drear
And naked shingles of the world.
That is to say, he heard bodied forth in the sounding sea the sombre intuitions and dismal forebodings of his own soul. Now, Wordsworth, with all his austerity of demeanour, was an optimist, and his most sombre moods are touched with a quiet gladness. He believed in a gentle God, and he had high hopes for man, and nature yielded him a Gospel that was one with his beliefs. So, when he looked out on the fields, it was his faith
. . .That every flower
Enjoys the air it breathes.
This meant that he enjoyed the air. And because in his own soul there glowed the light that never was on sea or land, therefore, when he stood on some headland, and saw the sun rise, he knew a visitation from the living God, and was wrapt into a still communion and ecstasy of thanksgiving. Nature gave back to him, intensified and clarified, the Gospel he first gave to her. And the supreme message of this sermon this morning is a deduction from what I have just said. You are on holiday, and detached from the workaday world, and hence you have leisure for spiritual culture. I would, therefore, have you realise the facts of your religion, and call the sleeping spiritualities of your soul to life. I would bid you recall all you have ever known and hoped of the love of God, all you have ever felt of the imperativeness of the good Life. And with these ideas consciously in your mind look out on nature for that which shall symbolise them, and so make them more clear and more beautiful to your soul. See in the white foam of some spreading wave an emblem of that purity that is so earnestly to be desired. See in the anemone that clings to the rock a suggestion of the tenacity with which you should hold to the bedrock of moral principle that is your spiritual safety; and realise that as each tide leaves the anemone the more developed for its engulfing, so, though faithfulness to principle means a whelming beneath waves of trouble, yet shall you grow the more spiritually strong what time the waters of affliction compass you round about. If you go into the country, and walk through the fields white to harvest, think of Him who walked as you two thousand years ago. And as you realise that their beauty is the sacrifice of the earth that men may Live, remember Him who died in the very summer of His manhood, that Life everlasting might be ours. O loving God, if Thou art so lovely in Thy creatures, how lovely must Thou be in Thyself. It is to the reverent soul and the devout mind that nature yields a Gospel. (J. G. Stevenson.)
After the holiday
St. Paul in his First Epistle to the Corinthians (1Co_14:10) says, There are, it may be, so many kinds of voices in the world, and no kind is without signification. He means, I suppose, that God has many ways of teaching men. It may be that there is a teacher for every faculty--for every avenue into the soul. A teacher for the ear--holy men spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. A teacher for the eye--for we are bidden by the Great Teacher to lift up our eyes and look on the fields, the flowers, the birds, the corn. In this age of much printing and many books, we too often think that we are learning only when we are reading. A man is regarded as a student who is always poring over books. But there were great students before there were books. Books are only transcripts of things, or if they are not they ought to be--records of what their authors saw or heard, or felt or imagined; and their value is in proportion to their fidelity to the sights, sounds, feelings, imaginations which proceeded. So that highly as we should value books, there are things more valuable--teachers greater than books. The earth is a greater, more reliable, more inspiring teacher than any books about her. The greatest learn of the earth itself. Sir Isaac Newton learnt of the earth more than of books. Charles Darwin spent his days in contact with nature far more than in his library. And the Great Teacher, Jesus Christ, felt this. I think He was a greater student of things than of books. And whilst He pointed men to the law and the prophets, He also pointed them to the earth as their teacher. His word consider, in such passages as Consider the lilies of the field, Consider the ravens, implies careful observation and reflection. As most of you know, I have been among the mountains, and these have chiefly been my teachers.
1. Now, how has all this beauty come into being? By delicate and gentle methods, such as the artists when he paints a picture? No, the very reverse of this has been the case. All this glory of form and colour is the result of the mightiest forces--forces which seemed to be only destructive--which no one would have thought tended to beauty; but they have. The glory of the mountains is the result of a mighty struggle. They are not the children of peace, but of a sword. And is it not so in life? The beauty of holiness--how is that wrought, by peaceful, quiet means, by the rest and be thankful method? No, by a similar strife. Just as God moulds these great mountains by forces that seem only destructive, so He moulds human life by means that seem cruel, but are not--by difficulty, by adversity, by loss, by sorrow, by things from which we shrink. But if these were taken out of life, how poor a set of beings we should be. The struggle which made the mountains was of long duration. Geology used to regard the earth as thrown into its present form by great and sudden upheavals. It is now generally admitted that the method was far slower and more gradual. And is it not so with the glory of character? That is not the child of one sharp, sudden, decisive struggle, though such may have contributed to its formation, but of long-continued strife against evil and long-continued pursuit of good. It is by the patient continuance in well-being that the prize of eternal life is won. We cry, Are we never to rest on our arms--never to repose in our tents--never utter the victors shout? Were it so the glory would be gone from life. Life would become dull and commonplace. The glory of life is in the conflict!
2. The mountains tell us not to judge by appearance. Few things are more deceptive in appearance than mountains. They belong to a land of illusion. You look at a great mountain like Mont Blanc, and to climb it seems only like a mornings walk across the snow. Some of the peaks near it which are far lower--some by thousands of feet--look as high or even higher. It is not till you bring the telescope to your aid that you realise the vastness of its height. The earth teaches no lesson more strongly than this, Judge not by appearance. Appearances nearly always mislead. Is it not so in the human realm? Here appearances conceal quite as often as they reveal. I once had a very sharp lesson on this point. I was at a conversazione, and noticed a man whose head and face were guiltless of the smallest scrap of hair. You know the look this gives. I said to a friend near me, Who is that idiot? He replied, Professor, the great authority on international law. I have never forgotten that incident. Since then I have remembered that the jewel may be in the leaden rather than the golden casket.
3. The earth teaches us that there are things beyond description. Beyond description in words, beyond description even in painting. Leslie Stephen, one of the most renowned of Alpine climbers, in a recent book says, He has seen, and tried for years to tell, how he is impressed by his beloved scenery, and annoyed by his own bungling whenever he has tried to get beyond arithmetical statements of hard geographical facts. With an envious sort of feeling he tells how Tennyson, who had never been higher than 7000 feet, was able to accomplish, through the genius of the poet, what he, with his far larger knowledge of the Alps, had never been able to do. He refers to a four-line stanza, which describes Monte Rosa as seen from the roof of Milan Cathedral, as really describing mountain glory. Here are the lines -
How faintly flushed, how phantom-fair
Was Monte Rosa hanging there;
A thousand shadowy-pencilled valleys,
And snowy dales in golden air.
That is lovely, but even that would give no idea, to one who had never seen, of the surpassing glory of that great mountain. Here lies the preachers difficulty. He has to speak of that which is beyond language to express. Even the apostles felt this difficulty, and so they spoke of a peace which passeth understanding, of a joy unspeakable and full of glory; of the love of Christ which passeth knowledge. But what eye cannot see, or ear hear, or the heart conceive, God reveals by His Spirit. (W. G. Horder.)
The discipline of life
Speak to the earth, and it will teach thee of God; of order; of man; of thyself. It cannot teach thee more. Consult the higher Teacher. Two kinds of agency enter into the discipline of life. There are first the elements that constitute the matter of life itself. These elements are such as make the inward and outward history of the individual being: parentage, education, examples, tendencies and temperaments. The matter which makes the history of life continues always to be an influence of life. The course of our studies, the activity of our business, the nature of our opinions, and of our friendships, the force of our affections, our health and sickness, our success or failure, our poverty or wealth, or ideas of poverty and wealth--all, in fact, that makes the sum of our being, physical, social, moral, and spiritual. The second kind of agency is that which we exercise of ourselves, and upon ourselves. A man is thus both the object and the agent of his own discipline. This kind of discipline cannot be too early begun, it cannot be too late continued. It may be too long deferred. It is by this agency of ourselves that we turn all things to account, that we make them our true property. But what is this discipline to act on? What is any education to act on, but on the human being, on the soul and its manifestations, on thought, on feeling, on habit, on conduct? It requires some discipline to think, in the true sense, at all. Whenever a real thought is born, it first meets with resistance, but when accepted, soon becomes a tradition. Feeling not under the guidance of thought is but blind impulse, and habits growing out of such impulse, even if blameless, become only mechanical routine. What is life for? The end of discipline is to make life that for which it is given. By deciding what that is, we determine at once the purpose of life, and the direction of its culture--moral and spiritual. Life, then, is for action, for work; for action and for work in the order of duty and of goodness. (Henry Giles.)
The harvest
Each season has its appropriate moral. Each lays upon us its own solemn obligation and duty. From a general and even a cursory sketch of the outward world, everyone must confess that the Almighty Maker of all things is a being of infinite benevolence and goodness. In connection with this fact of His benevolence, we must also feel our own constant dependence upon His bounty. There is incessant illustration of Divine providence. We cannot but view the constant reproduction of sustenance for mankind as a strong argument for Christian cheerfulness. But the facts of the harvest teach us, both in reference to our temporal affairs, and the more important concerns that relate to our everlasting salvation--where God operates, man must cooperate. Speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee. As we watch the anxious husbandman placing his corn seed into the ground, let every soul that is anxious for the spiritual improvement of those around it take courage. In due time he shall reap, if he faint not. Let our thoughts pass from the present life, which we spend here on earth as a shadow, unto that day, which cannot be far from any, when we ourselves shall be, in our bodies, sown for the great harvest of the assembled universe. That sowing cannot be contemplated by anyone without sensations of the profoundest awe and interest. (Thomas Jackson, M. A.)
Whispers of the spring
The argument of the patriarch is based on the fact that the hand of God is to be traced everywhere in nature and in human life. The words of the text are a striking expression of the truth that--
I. The earth is a material symbol of spiritual ideas. This thought has ever been dear to spiritual minds. They have loved to trace in visible nature suggestions regarding the invisible. It was preeminently characteristic of the Hebrews that they associated God with all natural phenomena. When Christ came He added intensity to the idea by connecting God with all natural life in its most commonplace as in its grandest manifestations. So the idea took possession of the Christian Church that nature and Scripture are but two pages of one revelation.
II. It is for us to interpret its symbolism and find its hidden meanings. Restrict attention to lessons suggested by the returning spring. What whisperings of hope, of trust, of joy may the inner ear catch as we speak to the earth in this season of its re-creation.
1. Speak, and it will teach thee of its Author. We see everywhere the operation of a marvellous power. Everywhere life and beauty are manifesting themselves. You may find secondary causes to explain the phenomena, but at last you are driven to the necessity of recognising one great first cause.
2. Speak to the earth, and it will teach thee of Gods superabounding care for the lowliest forms of life. The lowliest forms are shaped with the same care, and adorned with the same profusion that belong to the mightiest creations of God.
3. Speak to the earth, and it will teach thee that God means our human life to be bright and joyous. God recognises our innate sense of beauty, the imagination, the heart, with its chambers of imagery, and He makes appeal to this sense in the loveliness with which this spring season adorns the earth. Be not afraid of joy and brightness in life; they are no foes of a true spirituality.
4. Speak to the earth, and it will teach thee lessons of hopefulness.
(1) It whispers a message of hope for the mourner. What is this springtide but natures resurrection morning?
(2) Spring whispers a message of hope for all who have been defeated in lifes conflict. We see a hint in this season that a new start in life is possible.
(3) It whispers a message of hope for all who seek the worlds improvement. He who labours for the spiritual and moral advancement of his fellows must needs have faith and patience.
III. Speak then to the earth.
1. Hold frequent communion with nature. Such a habit expands the mind and refines the feelings.
2. Bring to the study of nature a spiritual heart. The dry light of reason is not enough if you would hear the subtlest whispers of natures voice.
3. Connect, as Christ did, all nature with God. He is the centre and all-pervading Spirit. Without the Divine idea nature is a harp from which the strings have been taken, a riddle to which there is no answer, a mystery without possibility of solution. (James Legge, M. A.)
Man and nature
In this age of bustle and toil, when the time set apart for quiet meditation and real recreation is so limited, we feel the more indebted to nature for the comforting cheer she brings us. One of the saddest things about our modern civilisation is that so many thousands of our fellow creatures have so little opportunity for obtaining instruction and pleasure from the sights and sounds of nature. The world of nature is in a very real sense our other self. When we stretch out our hands we feel her; we open our eyes and behold her; and her voices fill our ears. Our flesh is made of her dust; our nerves quiver with her energy; our blood is red with the life drawn from her bosom. In us is the principle of life, but in the surrounding world of nature are the conditions of that life. Speak to the earth and it shall teach thee. With how many voices does she speak to us. The world of nature is like its God, entire wherever we see a touch of His finger, whole in every one of its parts. In our own thoughts we detect irregularity, uncertainty, and imperfection; but in nature all is regular, blameless, and perfect. We can never sufficiently admire the perfection and harmony of natures works; even the lowest and smallest organisms, or the most delicate parts of these, like the fertilising parts of plants, are carried out with an infinite care and untiring labour, as if this particular part of nature were the only part, and that upon it she had been free to expend all her art and all her power. She never tires, never bungles her work. Not once or twice has she produced her masterpieces of workmanship, but myriads of times. And the same ideal perfection is to be found everywhere--perfection infinitely repeated. The abundance of natural beauty invites our most serious contemplation and presses itself upon our consideration. Disclosing itself to our view it will, almost without fail, deliver us from the care and anxiety of the moment. It will lift us out of present selfishness or foreboding fears and place us in a state of quiet rest. This is why a man who is tormented by passion or deep sorrow is revived and restored and sent on his way stronger in hope and abler for the duties of the day and hour by contact with nature. Nature is meant to minister to us, to contribute to our inward help and healing. There is as much Divine purpose in the coming of the seasons as in the recurrence of our daily duties, burdens, and temptations. God made the earth for the nurture of our spirits as well as for the support of our bodies. Can we with the eye of sense look at the heavens above us, and with the eye of faith pierce the external blue, and believe that the God who lives in the universe is a Being who has ears, but heareth not; who has eyes, but seeth not; who has a heart, but knows nothing of the wants and the needs of that broken heart of ours? This earth has not been framed by a mere utilitarian on the principle of feeding and clothing so many million consumers, but with regard also to soul, to provide the inner eye scenes of beauty and sublimity, to train our spirits to thought above dead matter by the spiritual forms with which matter is clothed, to lift us up from the dull content of animal existence to thoughts of illimitable freedom and range. We do not go to nature as constantly, intelligently, and earnestly as we should do. We do not resort to her as a teacher sent from God, as a great revealer of Divine truth. And yet we may hear the Divine voice in nature if we open our ears to her message. That voice was forever in the ears of the Psalmist; he heard Gods voice in the hurricane and in the calm. And the reason why we today do not hear God speaking to us in nature is that we allow the murmur of the world to stifle the whisper of heaven. To hold silent communings with the silent God in nature we must leave the bustle of the world behind us. We have come to regard mere bustle as so essential an element of human life that a love of solitude is taken as a mark of eccentricity. Too much solitude undoubtedly brings too great a self-consciousness. The hurry and worry of modern life causes shallow thought, unstable purpose, and wasted energy. The antidote is that silence and meditation, that communion with nature and our own heart, without which no great purpose is carried out and no great work is conceived or done. Natures pictures ought to awaken into active life all that is really beautiful in the sense of man. Speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee. If we cannot paint her glories or print them upon the speaking pages of a book, we can at least feel these glories and they should tend to our moral and spiritual elevation. There seems to be a distinct need in our time for something of the freshness of natural religion to be infused into our life. To shake ourselves free from artificial restrictions and restraints to which we ordinarily may be content to be subjected, to relax all conventional swathings, and to go forth in childlike liberty and ease and eagerness, is to learn the secret of nature. Live more simply and purely in all things is the message of nature; have intenser faith, be open-hearted, keep the soul in a quiet, receptive attitude. In no haste herself, she checks the hurry and fury of our habits and ensures a lofty calmness. The eagle is said to escape atmospheric tumult by rising into an upper calm that is always accessible. And, thanks to nature, there are blest arcadian retreats, easy of access, to all who care to seek for them, where pictures of wondrous beauty may be impressed upon the mind which for many a day will form a pleasant and profitable recollection to the beholder. The great thing is to be sincere and loving, ever thinking of nature as a revelation of God. Science is apt to give us a strained view of the world and to make us see only a chain of antecedents and sequences; it is apt to kill the finer and sweeter aspects of nature; on the other hand, the constant groping in the dust and grime of the market, and the incessant pursuit of pleasure are liable to paralyse all noble impulses and aspirations and make us think that the world is only for ignoble use and comfort. We must learn to look with Christs eyes at the earth on which we dwell and to see in it the revelation of the life and movement of the living God. (A. M. Sime.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.