Job 38:30

30. The waters are hid as with a stone The waters harden like stone. Thus Furst, etc. The root idea of חבא is that of “hiding,” “concealing:” here used in the Hithpael it signifies “they hide themselves.” in other words, “congeal;” to which Umbreit gives the idea of “hiding under a stone.” The comparison to a stone is introduced rather to show the result of freezing, which is a hardness like that of stone, כאבן . The son of Sirach speaks of the cold north wind clothing the water as with a breastplate. Sir 43:20 .

Is frozen Cleaves together. See note on Job 37:10. The same word, יתלכדו , is used in Job 41:17 of the joining together of the scales of the leviathan. The face of the deep closes in together after the manner of the human face, (thus Hitzig,) whose lineaments constitute the countenance. Tyndall, in his treatise on “The Structure and Properties of Ice,” describes the transmission, in various directions, of sunbeams, condensed by a lens, through slabs of ice. “The path of every beam was observed to be instantly studded with lustrous spots, which increased in magnitude and number as the action continued. On examining the spots more closely they were found to be flattened spheroids, and around each of them the ice was so liquified as to form a beautiful flower-shaped figure possessing six petals. From this number there was no deviation. At first the edges of the liquid leaves were unindented; but a continuance of the action usually caused the edges to become serrated like those of ferns.” In his work on “Forms of Water,” (pp. 35-38.) the same author says, “In all cases the flowers are formed parallel to the surface of freezing. They are formed when the sun shines upon the ice of every lake; sometimes in myriads, and so small as to require a magnifying glass to see them.… Here we have a reversal of the process of crystallization… In this exquisite way every bit of the ice over which our skaters glide in winter is put together.”