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Project Job

Introduction

Project Job is an study in coincidence and synchronicity.

It began decades ago when I first stumbled upon the sentence "I am a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls" in Job 30:29. At the time, I thought it was simply an example of excellent writing. I love the mood it evokes.

Later, I chanced upon this passage in Michah 1:8: "Therefore I will wail and howl, I will go stripped and naked: I will make a wailing like the dragons, and mourning as the owls." Surely it was just a coincidence, but again I loved the imagery and the emotion the passage evoked.

THen years later, in Isaiah 34:13, I discovered this passage: "And thorns shall come up in her palaces, nettles and brambles in the fortresses thereof: and it shall be an habitation of dragons, and a court for owls." Again, I loved the sound of it and the images it conjured in my mind.

But then I started to wonder: Three verses in different books of the Bible, all containing owls and dragons and all concerned with the same feeling of desolation and loss -- and yet you don't see the speaker as defeated. You imagine he is surviving, standing among the ruins, ready to continue the fight.

Now put all three verses together into one passage:

"I am a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls. Therefore I will wail and howl, I will go stripped and naked: I will make a wailing like the dragons, and mourning as the owls. And thorns shall come up in her palaces, nettles and brambles in the fortresses thereof: and it shall be an habitation of dragons, and a court for owls."

Beautiful.

Naturally, I wondered if there were other verses. These seem to be the only three sentences in which owls and dragons both appear. However, both creatures are quiet popular in the King James version of the Bible. I have a few ideas as to why that would be, but for now, let's concern outselves only with the verses themselves.

First I complied all mention of owls and dragons in the King James Version of the Bible. Then I eliminated all the duplications. Oddly enough, there are quite a few places in which verses are repeated almost word for word. I assume the writers borrowed from one another or the phrases were common cliches of the period the KJV was written. Next, I sorted the lines into two divisions: past tense and future tense. All the phrases were either history or prophecy it seems. Finally, I sorted the lines in alphabetical order. On a whim, I decided I like the descending order sort better than the ascending. (The Word descending into the World of Man?)

The results can be found here.

The next stage, of course, is interpretation. Feel free to try your hand at interpreting or arranging the verses yourself. Think of it as modern quabbalah with understanding as the prize.

Fiat Lux.

By Darryl Riser

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