12:14 no opening. After speaking of the creation (Job 12:7-10), Job seems to have thought of his ancestor Noah, and the great Flood. The Lord permanently “broke down” the antediluvian civilization so that it could not be “built again.” Then He “shut him in” (Genesis 7:16) the ark, the one man in that world who had obeyed God.

12:15 overturn the earth. God had “withheld the waters” in the primeval “waters above the firmament” (Genesis 1:7), so that there was no “rain upon the earth” (Genesis 2:5) in the antediluvian period. But then, when the iniquity of the antediluvian people was full, He sent the waters out and they overturned the earth!