These two verses are linked by when, referring to the time of the action in verse 37.

Who can number the clouds by wisdom? asks if anyone has the wisdom to get an accurate count of the vast number of clouds in the sky. This may refer to the fact that their number changes constantly, and so before anyone could reach a total, the counting would have to begin again, and again. Wisdom here has more to do with skill than knowledge, and so Bible en français courant “Who is sufficiently skilled to count the clouds?”

Tilt the waterskins of the heavens depicts the clouds as water containers, as in 26.8a. Tilt translates the causative form of a verb meaning “to lay something down,” that is, “to turn on its side,” or more specifically of a water-filled container, “to pour out.” This line may be rendered, for example, as “and to pour out the rain from the water jars in the sky” or “turn over the clouds and pour out the rain.”

When the dust runs into a mass depicts a situation that exists at the time of the pouring out of the rain in verse 37. It is the action of the rain that hardens the dust. A literal rendering can be “when the dust hardens into a mass.”

The clods cleave fast together says something similar to the statement in line a, but clods, lumps of soil, replaces dust. As in line a, the action of the rain is to cause clods of earth to stick together and thus make larger clods. Good News Translation reduces the two lines to one and places verse 38 in apposition to “rain” in verse 37. However, the rain is performing two distinct actions on the ground, one on the dust and the other on the clods. New English Bible expresses both lines well: “… when the dusty soil sets hard as iron, and the clods of earth cling together?” This may also be expressed, for example, “… when the dusty ground forms hard clumps, and the clods of earth stick together?”

Quoted with permission from Reyburn, Wiliam. A Handbook on Job. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1992. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .