Job 37:18

37:18 will you, with him, spread out ¹  the clouds,

solid as a mirror of molten metal?

Genesis 1:6-7

1:6 God said, “Let there be an expanse ²  in the midst of the waters and let it separate water ³  from water. 1:7 So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. ⁴  It was so. ⁵ 

Psalms 33:6

33:6 By the Lord’s decree ⁶  the heavens were made;

by a mere word from his mouth all the stars in the sky were created. ⁷ 

Psalms 104:2-3

104:2 He covers himself with light as if it were a garment.

He stretches out the skies like a tent curtain,

104:3 and lays the beams of the upper rooms of his palace on the rain clouds. ⁸ 

He makes the clouds his chariot,

and travels along on the wings of the wind. ⁹ 

Isaiah 40:22

40:22 He is the one who sits on the earth’s horizon; ¹⁰ 

its inhabitants are like grasshoppers before him. ¹¹ 

He is the one who stretches out the sky like a thin curtain, ¹² 

and spreads it out ¹³  like a pitched tent. ¹⁴ 

Isaiah 42:5

42:5 This is what the true God, ¹⁵  the Lord, says –

the one who created the sky and stretched it out,

the one who fashioned the earth and everything that lives on it, ¹⁶ 

the one who gives breath to the people on it,

and life to those who live on it: ¹⁷ 

Isaiah 44:24

The Lord Empowers Cyrus

44:24 This is what the Lord, your protector, ¹⁸  says,

the one who formed you in the womb:

“I am the Lord, who made everything,

who alone stretched out the sky,

who fashioned the earth all by myself, ¹⁹ 

Jeremiah 10:11

10:11 You people of Israel should tell those nations this:

‘These gods did not make heaven and earth.

They will disappear ²⁰  from the earth and from under the heavens.’ ²¹ 

Zechariah 12:1

The Repentance of Judah

12:1 The revelation of the word of the Lord concerning Israel: The Lord – he who stretches out the heavens and lays the foundations of the earth, who forms the human spirit within a person ²²  – says,

[37:18]  ¹ tn The verb means “to beat out; to flatten,” and the analogy in the next line will use molten metal. From this verb is derived the word for the “firmament” in Gen 1:6-8, that canopy-like pressure area separating water above and water below.

[1:6]  ² tn The Hebrew word refers to an expanse of air pressure between the surface of the sea and the clouds, separating water below from water above. In v. 8 it is called “sky.”

[1:6]  ³ tn Heb “the waters from the waters.”

[1:7]  ⁴ tn Heb “the expanse.”

[1:7]  ⁵ tn This statement indicates that it happened the way God designed it, underscoring the connection between word and event.

[33:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “word.”

[33:6]  ⁷ tn Heb “and by the breath of his mouth all their host.” The words “were created” are added in the translation for stylistic reasons; they are understood by ellipsis (note “were made” in the preceding line). The description is consistent with Gen 1:16, which indicates that God spoke the heavenly luminaries into existence.

[104:3]  ⁸ tn Heb “one who lays the beams on water [in] his upper rooms.” The “water” mentioned here corresponds to the “waters above” mentioned in Gen 1:7. For a discussion of the picture envisioned by the psalmist, see L. I. J. Stadelmann, The Hebrew Conception of the World, 44-45.

[104:3]  ⁹ sn Verse 3 may depict the Lord riding a cherub, which is in turn propelled by the wind current. Another option is that the wind is personified as a cherub. See Ps 18:10 and the discussion of ancient Near Eastern parallels to the imagery in M. Weinfeld, “‘Rider of the Clouds’ and ‘Gatherer of the Clouds’,” JANESCU 5 (1973): 422-24.

[40:22]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “the circle of the earth” (so KJV, NIV, NRSV, NLT).

[40:22]  ¹¹ tn The words “before him” are supplied in the translation for clarification.

[40:22]  ¹² tn The otherwise unattested noun דֹּק (doq), translated here “thin curtain,” is apparently derived from the verbal root דקק (“crush”) from which is derived the adjective דַּק (daq, “thin”; see HALOT 229 s.v. דקק). The nuance “curtain” is implied from the parallelism (see “tent” in the next line).

[40:22]  ¹³ tn The meaning of the otherwise unattested verb מָתַח (matakh, “spread out”) is determined from the parallelism (note the corresponding verb “stretch out” in the previous line) and supported by later Hebrew and Aramaic cognates. See HALOT 654 s.v. *מתה.

[40:22]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “like a tent [in which] to live”; NAB, NASB “like a tent to dwell (live NIV, NRSV) in.”

[42:5]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “the God.” The definite article here indicates distinctiveness or uniqueness.

[42:5]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “and its offspring” (so NASB); NIV “all that comes out of it.”

[42:5]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “and spirit [i.e., “breath”] to the ones walking in it” (NAB, NASB, and NRSV all similar).

[44:24]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “your redeemer.” See the note at 41:14.

[44:24]  ¹⁹ tn The consonantal text (Kethib) has “Who [was] with me?” The marginal reading (Qere) is “from with me,” i.e., “by myself.” See BDB 87 s.v. II אֵת 4.c.

[10:11]  ²⁰ tn Aram “The gods who did not make…earth will disappear…” The sentence is broken up in the translation to avoid a long, complex English sentence in conformity with contemporary English style.

[10:11]  ²¹ tn This verse is in Aramaic. It is the only Aramaic sentence in Jeremiah. Scholars debate the appropriateness of this verse to this context. Many see it as a gloss added by a postexilic scribe which was later incorporated into the text. Both R. E. Clendenen (“Discourse Strategies in Jeremiah 10,” JBL 106 [1987]: 401-8) and W. L. Holladay (Jeremiah [Hermeneia], 1:324-25, 334-35) have given detailed arguments that the passage is not only original but the climax and center of the contrast between the Lord and idols in vv. 2-16. Holladay shows that the passage is a very carefully constructed chiasm (see accompanying study note) which argues that “these” at the end is the subject of the verb “will disappear” not the attributive adjective modifying heaven. He also makes a very good case that the verse is poetry and not prose as it is rendered in the majority of modern English versions.

[12:1]  ²² tn Heb “who forms the spirit of man within him” (so NIV).