something covered over and hidden from view, almost certainly a person's inmost being in one of its two biblical uses; what it names in the other use is genuinely unknown
This word shows up only twice in the whole Hebrew Bible, and the two appearances point in different directions. Its root most likely means "to plaster, coat, or cover over," the same verb used for plastering a wall (Leviticus 14; Ezekiel 13). So at its root, this word names something that has been covered up or concealed, not left out in the open.
In Psalm 51:6, that sense is on fairly solid ground. The word sits next to another word for "what is hidden," and nearly every commentator, ancient and modern, reads the line as being about a person's inward being: the private truth inside someone that only God can fully see. Ancient Jewish interpreters went further and identified it concretely with the kidneys (כִּלְיָה), an organ the Old Testament often treats as the seat of conscience, the place inside a person where God tests and instructs (compare Psalm 16:7, where the kidneys "instruct" at night).
Job 38:36 is a different story. There the word appears in a poetic list of nature's wonders, paired with an equally mysterious word usually rendered "rooster." Because both words are so rare, scholars genuinely cannot agree on what is being asked.
- Some think the verse is still about human insight or the mind, matching the Psalm.
- Others think the surrounding verses, which are all about clouds, rain, and lightning, mean this word should be read as "clouds" or "mist."
- Still others think it names a bird, the ibis, forming a natural pair with a rooster, since both birds were thought in the ancient world to sense the weather.
- A few have even proposed it disguises the name of the Egyptian god of wisdom.
Because of this split, the safest way to read the word is to treat Psalm 51:6 as reasonably settled, an inward, hidden part of a person, while treating Job 38:36 as an open question that no single English translation can honestly resolve.
Nuances
What this word names in Job 38:36, where it is paired with an equally obscure word often read as rooster.
- contestedIt matches Psalm 51:6, naming human insight or the mind, so the verse asks who gave people (and roosters) their understanding.; Robert Gordis, The Book of Job (Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1978); S. R. Driver and G. B. Gray, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Book of Job, ICC (T&T Clark, 1921)
- minorityIt names storm clouds or mist, fitting the weather imagery of the surrounding verses about lightning and rain.; Samuel Terrien, Job, The Interpreter's Bible vol. 3 (Abingdon, 1954); Norman Habel, The Book of Job, Old Testament Library (Westminster John Knox, 1985)
- contestedIt names a bird, the ibis, forming a natural pair with the rooster, since both birds were credited in the ancient world with sensing the weather.; Edouard Dhorme, Le livre de Job (Gabalda, 1926; English translation 1967); John Hartley, The Book of Job, NICOT (Eerdmans, 1988)
- minorityIt disguises the name of the Egyptian god of wisdom, Thoth, with the paired word naming a related Egyptian figure for the planet Mercury.; Marvin Pope, Job, Anchor Bible (Doubleday, 1965; 3rd ed. 1973)