The Book of Job, plate 1: Thus did Job continually

William Blake · 1825
The Cleveland Museum of Art

The first of the 21 plates William Blake engraved for his Illustrations of the Book of Job, dated 1825. The painter John Linnell paid him to engrave the set after watercolours Blake had made some fifteen years before.

Job and his wife sit under a great tree with open books, their children kneeling around them and the flock lying in front. Around the picture Blake engraved a border with lines from the Bible in his own lettering.

From the text

A man in the land of Uz, “blameless and upright” (Job 1:1)

Seven sons and three daughters (Job 1:2)

“This was Job’s regular practice” (Job 1:5)

The artist’s own

Instruments hung silent in the tree — the last plate shows the family playing them

A Gothic church on the horizon, as in an English landscape

The setting sun on one side, a crescent moon on the other

Details

Silent instruments

A harp, lyres and horns hang in the branches, not being played.

Job and his wife

They sit with open books on their knees, their children kneeling round them.

A church at sunset

The sun goes down behind a Gothic church on the hill.

The flock

Sheep and rams lie resting along the front of the picture.

William Blake, British, 1757–1827. The Cleveland Museum of Art (Mr. and Mrs. Charles G. Prasse Collection, 1963.303.2) · Engraving (proof impression) · Cleveland Museum of Art Open Access: Collection API record "share_license_status": "CC0" (Creative Commons Zero, https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/).

The verses

Job 1:1–5There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job. And this man was blameless and upright, fearing God and shunning evil. He had seven sons and three daughters, and he owned 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, 500 female donkeys, and a very large number of servants. Job was the greatest man of all the people of the East. Job’s sons would take turns holding feasts in their homes, and they would invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them. And when the days of feasting were over, Job would send for his children to purify them, rising early in the morning to offer burnt offerings for all of them. For Job thought, “Perhaps my children have sinned and cursed God in their hearts.” This was Job’s regular practice.