Job 26:7

It may be doubtful whether "the north" refers to the northern part of the earth or to the northern heavens. In favour of the latter reference is the fact that the expression "stretch out," often said in regard to the heavens (e.g. ch. Job 9:8), is not elsewhere used with reference to the earth, and it is scarcely probable that "the earth" would be used as a parallel to "the north," a part of the earth. The northern region of the heavens also, with its brilliant constellations clustering round the pole, would naturally attract the eye, and seem to the beholder, who looked up to it through the transparent atmosphere, to be stretched out over the "empty place," that is, the vast void between earth and heaven. That a different mode of representation is found elsewhere, the arch of the heavens being spoken of as reposing on the earth (Isaiah 40:22), is of little consequence. Where religious wonder and poetical feeling, not scientific thought, dictate the language in which nature and its phenomena are described, uniformity of conception or expression is not to be looked for. And the words seem to refer to the appearance of the heavens by night, when the horizon is not so visible, and the dark "void" between earth and heaven more impressive. Others think of the northern region of the earth, the region where lofty mountains rise, and whose stability without support seems most wonderful. It is difficult in this case, however, to conjecture what the void is over which the "north" is stretched; the opinion of Ewald that it is the abyss of Sheol is too adventurous.

hangeth the earth upon nothing To hang "upon" is to hang from; the representation, therefore, is that the earth is suspended, attached to nothing aboveit which sustains its weight, not that it hangs with no support underit. The representation obviously is the other side of that in reference to "the north" in the first clause. The eye was impressed by the great void between earth and the starry heavens. The latter were stretched over this abyss, upheld by nothing under them, a striking instance of the power of God; while the broad face of the earth lay firm below this void though hung from no support that upheld it. The idea of modern astronomy that the earth is a ball, poised free on all sides in space, is of course not found here.