Does this typify the fate of the world when the great catastrophe occurred?  Does the debate between Job and his three visitors represent the discussion which took place in the hearts of the miserable remnants of mankind, as they lay hid in caverns, touching God, his power, his goodness, his justice; and whether or not this world-appalling calamity was the result of the sins of the people or otherwise?

Let us see what glimpses of these things we can find in the text of the book.

When Job’s afflictions fall upon him he curses his day—­the day, as commonly understood, wherein he was born.  But how can one curse a past period of time and ask the darkness to cover it?

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The original text is probably a reference to the events that were then transpiring: 

“Let that day be turned into darkness; let not God regard it from above; and let not the light shine upon it.  Let darkness and the shadow of death cover it; let a mist overspread it, and let it be wrapped up in bitterness. Let a darksome whirlwind seize upon that night. . . .  Let them curse it who curse the clay, who are ready to raise up a leviathan."[1]

De Dieu says it should read, “And thou, leviathan, rouse up.”  “Let a mist overspread it”; literally, “let a gathered mass of dark clouds cover it.”

“The Fathers generally understand the devil to be meant by the leviathan.”

We shall see that it means the fiery dragon, the comet: 

“Let the stars be darkened with the mist thereof; let it expect light and not see it, nor the rising of the dawning of the day."[2]

In other words, Job is not imprecating future evils on a past time—­an impossibility, an absurdity:  he is describing the events then transpiring—­the whirlwind, the darkness, the mist, the day that does not come, and the leviathan, the demon, the comet.

Job seems to regret that he has escaped with his life: 

“For now,” he says, “should I have lain still and been quiet,” (if I had not fled) “I should have slept:  then had I been at rest, with kings and counsellors of the earth, which built desolate places for themselves; or with princes that had gold, who filled their houses with silver."[3]

Job looks out over the whole world, swept bare of its inhabitants, and regrets that he did not stay and bide the

[1.  Douay version, chapter iii, verses 4-8.

2.  Ibid., verse 9.

3.  King James’s version, chapter iii, verses 18-15.]

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pelting of the pitiless storm, as, if he had done so, he would be now lying dead with kings and counselors, who built places for themselves, now made desolate, and with princes who, despite their gold and silver, have perished.  Kings and counselors do not build “desolate places” for themselves; they build in the heart of great communities; in the midst of populations:  the places may become desolate afterward.