Chambers of the South

CHAMBERS IN THE SOUTH (OF) (Heb. חַדְרֵ֥י תֵמָֽן, ταμεἰ̂α νότου, Vul. interiora austri). This expression is used in Job 9:9 along with mention of the constellations of the Great Bear, Orion, and the Pleiades. In Babylonian astronomy there is no S pole corresponding to the N pole, but instead a region called Ea. Job is supposedly applying the term “chambers of the south” to the constellations of this region. Some scholars identify it with stars in the constellations of Argo, Centaurus, and the Southern Cross. Others regard the expression as too indefinite to refer to any special star or group of stars, and take it to refer in general to the constellations of the southern hemisphere, or they refer it to the vacant stretches of the southern sky, and identify it with the “chamber” from the which the whirlwind is said to come (Job 37:9).

Additional Material

The twelve constellations of the Zodiac.

See Astronomy, sec. II, 12.