Job 6:15

15. As a brook The Arabians, as Schultens observes, compare a faithless friend to a mountain torrent. Thus, “I put no trust in the flowing of thy torrent.” The Greek Artemidorus, writing on dreams, interprets those of running water to indicate change and instability. The apostle is supposed by some to make use of the figure of our text in his exhortation against spiritual defection. (Hebrews 2:1.)

Stream of brooks Rather, the bed of torrents wadies in which Arabia and Palestine abound. Dillmann urges that עבר should be rendered overflow, instead of pass away which certainly could not be said of the channels and that it is in better accord with the description which assumes that the channels are full. “The long, winding valleys,” in the graphic words of the recent traveller, Palmer, “by which the mountain groups are intersected, are called wadies. They are not at all like the valleys to which we are accustomed in Europe, but present rather the appearance of dry, sandy river-beds. They are, in fact, the courses along which the torrents from the mountains find their way down to the sea; but, as rain seldom falls, and as there is no soil or vegetation on the mountain sides to collect or absorb the gentle showers when they do come, the valleys are never filled except on the occasion of some fierce storm bursting over the mountains which they drain.” Desert of the Exodus, p. 22.