Job 2:7

with sore boils It is generally agreed that the disease of Job was the leprosy called Elephantiasis, so named because the swollen limbs and the black and corrugated skin of those afflicted by it resemble those of the elephant. It is said by ancient authors, as Pliny, to be peculiar to Egypt, but it is found in other hot countries such as the Hijâz, and even in northern climates as Norway. It is said to attack the limbs first, breaking out below the knees and gradually spreading over the whole body. We are probably to consider, however, that Job was smitten "from the sole of his foot unto his crown" all at once. Full details of its appearance and the sensations of those affected may be gathered from the Book, though, being poetically coloured, they will hardly bear to be read like a page from a handbook of Pathology. The ulcers were accompanied by an itching so intolerable that a piece of potsherd was taken to scrape the sores and remove the feculent discharge, Job 2:8. The form and countenance were so disfigured by the disease that the sufferer's friends could not recognise him, Job 2:12. The ulcers seized the whole body both without and inwardly, Job 19:20, making the breath fetid, and emitting a loathsome smell that drove every one from the sufferer's presence, Job 19:17, and made him seek refuge outside the village upon the heap of ashes, Job 2:8. The sores, which bred worms, Job 7:5, alternately closed, having the appearance of clods of earth, and opened and ran, so that the body was alternately swollen and emaciated, Job 16:8. The patient was haunted with horrible dreams, Job 7:14, and unearthly terrors, Job 3:25, and harassed by a sensation of choking, Job 7:15, which made his nights restless and frightful, Job 7:4, as his incessant pains made his days weary, Job 7:1-4. His bones were filled with gnawing pains, as if a fire burned in them, Job 30:30, or as if his limbs were tortured in the stocks, Job 13:27, or wrenched off, Job 30:17. He was helpless, and his futile attempts to rise from the ground provoked the merriment of the children who played about the heap where he lay, Job 19:18. The disease was held incurable, though the patient might linger many years, and his hopelessness of recovery made him long for death, Job 3:20 and often. Delitzsch and Dillmann refer to various treatises on the subject, in particular, to one published at the cost of the Norwegian Government, Danielsen et Boeck, Traité de la Spédalskhed ou Éléphantiasis des Grecs(with coloured plates), Paris, 1848.