Modern readers tend to think of Job as a philosophical work, a biblical version of a platonic dialogue where characters debate life’s most profound questions. But anyone who attempts to read it in Hebrew knows immediately that it is also a work of poetry—as evidenced, in part, by its rarefied vocabulary and often-confounding syntax. Robert Alter deems its author not only “the greatest of all biblical poets,” but “one of the most remarkable poets who flourished in any language in the ancient Mediterranean world.” He writes:

He is a technical virtuoso, deftly marshaling sound and rhythm for expressive effects, at times deploying brilliant word-play—as when he writes, “My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle,/ they snap off without any hope,” the word for “hope,” tikvah, punning on a homonym that means “thread”—utilizing a vocabulary that is the most extensive of any biblical poet, with borrowings from Aramaic, an enlisting of rare words, and even introducing words that seem to be his own invention.

His range of metaphors is inventive and often dazzling, drawing on cheese-making, weaving, horticulture, and much more. Had there been bicycles in ancient Israel, I suspect we would find a bicycle simile somewhere in his poem. He exhibits an interest in nature quite untypical of biblical poets. And no other poet of his time and place possessed his ability to link together different passages with recurrent terms and images, even over long stretches of text.

After offering a tour of Job’s poetic prowess, examining such “daring and beautiful” metaphors of the “eyelids of dawn,” Alter contends that the book’s style cannot be disconnected from its theological message. The divine voice that appears in a whirlwind at the book’s end and recites the final poem

does not really provide an answer for the dilemma of unwarranted suffering under a supposedly just God. But that dilemma has no real answer. There is no way of explaining why an innocent child should die of cancer or a benevolent woman perish in a fire with all her family. What the poetry does manage to do is carry us away in its sweep, in the brilliance of its riveting and sometimes startling imagery, occasion us to see the world freshly, prod us to let go of our habitual notions of man as the master of nature and the measure of all things, and realize that contradiction and anomaly and even violence are at the heart of reality—in sum, to accept the limitations of human imagination.

For more than a year, the Iran-backed Houthis have been launching drones and missiles at ships traversing the Red Sea, as well as at Israeli territory, in support of Hamas. This development has drastically curtailed shipping through the Suez Canal and the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, driving up trade prices. This week, the Trump administration began an extensive bombing campaign against the Houthis in an effort to reopen that crucial waterway. Burcu Ozcelik highlights another benefit of this action:

The administration has a broader geopolitical agenda—one that includes countering China’s economic leverage, particularly Beijing’s reliance on Iranian oil. By targeting the Houthis, the United States is not only safeguarding vital shipping lanes but also exerting pressure on the Iran-China energy nexus, a key component of Beijing’s strategic posture in the region.

China was the primary destination for up to 90 percent of Iran’s oil exports in 2024, underscoring the deepening economic ties between Beijing and Tehran despite U.S. sanctions. By helping fill Iranian coffers, China aids Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in financing proxies like the Houthis. Since October of last year, notable U.S. Treasury announcements have revealed covert links between China and the Houthis.

Striking the Houthis could trigger broader repercussions—not least by disrupting the flow of Iranian oil to China. While difficult to confirm, it is conceivable and has been reported, that the Houthis may have received financial or other forms of compensation from China (such as Chinese-made military components) in exchange for allowing freedom of passage for China-affiliated vessels in the Red Sea.