Look to the heavens and see; gaze at the clouds high above you.
Parallel translations
- WEB Look to the heavens, and see. See the skies, which are higher than you.
- KJV Look unto the heavens, and see; and behold the clouds which are higher than thou.
- NKJV Look to the heavens and see; And behold the clouds— They are higher than you.
- NASB “Look at the heavens and see; And look at the clouds—they are higher than you.
- NLT Look up into the sky, and see the clouds high above you.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Elihu tells Job to look up at the heavens and skies far above him. The vast heights illustrate God's exalted transcendence.
Overview
Elihu directs Job's gaze to the towering heavens to teach a lesson about God's greatness and distance above humanity. The heavens declare a Creator whose ways far surpass ours (Ps. 8:3-4; Isa. 55:9). This contemplation of God's transcendence prepares the argument that human sin or righteousness cannot diminish or augment the infinite God, who nonetheless stooped to save us in Christ.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 11
- Job 22:12Is not God as high as the heavens? Look at the highest stars, how lofty they are!
- Isa 55:9“For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so My ways are higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.
- Nah 1:3The LORD is slow to anger and great in power; the LORD will by no means leave the guilty unpunished. His path is in the whirlwind and storm, and clouds are the dust beneath His feet.
- Isa 40:22–23He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth; its dwellers are like grasshoppers. He stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in.
- Job 25:5–6If even the moon does not shine, and the stars are not pure in His sight,
- Gen 15:5And the LORD took him outside and said, “Now look to the heavens and count the stars, if you are able.” Then He told him, “So shall your offspring be.”
- 1 Kgs 8:27But will God indeed dwell upon the earth? Even heaven, the highest heaven, cannot contain You, much less this temple I have built.
- Ps 8:3–4When I behold Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have set in place—
- Job 37:22–23Out of the north He comes in golden splendor; awesome majesty surrounds Him.
- Job 36:26Indeed, God is great—beyond our knowledge; the number of His years is unsearchable.
- Job 37:16Do you understand how the clouds float, those wonders of Him who is perfect in knowledge?
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Commentaries & study tools
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
Job's cry for a mediator who can lay his hand on both God and man, and his confidence that 'my Redeemer lives' and will stand on the earth, reaches forward to Jesus the living Redeemer.
How Job 35:5 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.