JOB'S DISEASE. The opinion that the malady under which Job suffered was elephan tiasis, or black leprosy, is so ancient, that it is found, according to Origen's Hexapla, in the rendering which one of the Greek versions has made of ch. ii. 7. It was also entertained by Abulfeda (Hist. Anteisl. p. 26) ; and, in modern times, by the best scholars generally. The pas sages which are considered to indicate this disease are found in the description of his skin burning from head to foot, so that he took a potsherd tc scrape himself (ii. 7, 8) ; in its being covered with putrefaction and crusts of earth, and being at one time stiff and hard, while at another it cracked and discharged fluid (vii. 5) ; in the offensive breath which drove away the kindness of attendants (xix. 17) ; in the restless nights, which were either sleep less or scared with frightful dreams (vii. 13, 14 ; xxx. 17) ; in general emaciation (xvi. 8) • and in so intense a loathing of the burden of fife, that strangling and death were preferable to it (vii. 15).
In this picture of Job's sufferin,s, the state of the skin is not so distinctly described as to enable us to identify the disease with elephantiasis in a rigorous sense. The difficulty is also increased by
the fact that 1,17J, shcchin, is generally rendered boils.' But that word, according to its radical sense, only means burning, inji'anunation—a hot scnse of pain, which, although it attends boils and abscesses, is common to other cutaneous irritations. Moreover, the fact that Job scraped himself a potsherd is irreconcilable with the notion that his body was covered with boiis or open sores, but agrees very weIl with the thickened state of the skin which characterizes this disease.
In this, as in most other Biblical diseases, there is too little distinct description of symptoms to enable us to determine the precise malady in tended. But the general character of the com plaint under which Job suffered, bears a greater resemblance to elephantiasis than to any other disease [LEPRosv].—W. A. N.