AIR. The Air is often meant by the word Heaven; the birds of the Heaven, for the birds of the Air. God rained fire Gen. xix. 24. 1 Kings i. 10.and brimstone upon Sodom from Heaven; that is to say, from the Air. Let fire come down from Heaven; that is, from the Air. Moses menaces the Israelites with the effects of God’s wrath to destroy them Deut. xxviii. 22. the Hebrew שרפוןLXX. ‘Ανεμοφθορία.with a pestilential Air. Percutiat te Dominus aëre corrupto; or perhaps with a scorching wind, which produces mortal diseases, or with a drought which blasts the crops of corn.
Vide 1 Kings viii. 37. 1 Cor. ix. 26. Ch. xiv. 9.To beat the Air, to speak in the Air, are ways of expressing things which are in use even in our own tongue, and signify to speak without judgment or understanding, to fatigue ourselves in vain. The Powers of the Air, Eph. ii. 2. are the Devils, who exercise their power principally in the Air, by exciting winds, storms and tempests.