Job Chapter 41
1 "Can you draw out Leviathan with a fish hook, or press down his tongue with a cord?
2 Can you put a rope into his nose, or pierce his jaw through with a hook?
3 Will he make many petitions to you, or will he speak soft words to you?
4 Will he make a covenant with you, that you should take him for a servant forever?
5 Will you play with him as with a bird? Or will you bind him for your girls?
6 Will traders barter for him? Will they part him amongst the merchants?
7 Can you fill his skin with barbed irons, or his head with fish spears?
8 Lay your hand on him. Remember the battle, and do so no more.
9 Behold, the hope of him is in vain. Won't one be cast down even at the sight of him?
10 None is so fierce that he dare stir him up. Who then is he who can stand before me?
11 Who has first given to me, that I should repay him? Everything under the heavens is mine.
12 "I will not keep silence concerning his limbs, nor his mighty strength, nor his goodly frame.
13 Who can strip off his outer garment? Who will come within his jaws?
14 Who can open the doors of his face? Around his teeth is terror.
15 Strong scales are his pride, shut up together with a close seal.
16 One is so near to another, that no air can come between them.
17 They are joined to one another. They stick together, so that they can't be pulled apart.
18 His sneezing flashes out light. His eyes are like the eyelids of the morning.
19 Out of his mouth go burning torches. Sparks of fire leap out.
20 Out of his nostrils a smoke goes, as of a boiling pot over a fire of reeds.
21 His breath kindles coals. A flame goes out of his mouth.
22 There is strength in his neck. Terror dances before him.
23 The flakes of his flesh are joined together. They are firm on him. They can't be moved.
24 His heart is as firm as a stone, yes, firm as the lower millstone.
25 When he raises himself up, the mighty are afraid. They retreat before his thrashing.
26 If one attacks him with the sword, it can't prevail; nor the spear, the dart, nor the pointed shaft.
27 He counts iron as straw; and bronze as rotten wood.
28 The arrow can't make him flee. Sling stones are like chaff to him.
29 Clubs are counted as stubble. He laughs at the rushing of the javelin.
30 His undersides are like sharp potsherds, leaving a trail in the mud like a threshing sledge.
31 He makes the deep to boil like a pot. He makes the sea like a pot of ointment.
32 He makes a path shine after him. One would think the deep had white hair.
33 On earth there is not his equal, that is made without fear.
34 He sees everything that is high. He is king over all the sons of pride."
Footnotes
- Verse 1 (Leviathan)
- Leviathan is a name for a crocodile or dinosaur or similar creature.
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Job Chapter 41 Guide
Leviathan is a real but unidentified, fearsome water-dwelling creature, and there is the playfulness of a great tenderness in the suggestions Jehovah makes to Job about these fierce creations. Can Job catch him with a rope or a hook? Will he pray to Job? Will Job make a servant or a plaything of him for himself or his maidens? There is a fine, and yet most tender and humorous, satire in the words of Jehovah!
Lay thine hand upon him; Remember the battle, and do so no more.
If none dare stir up leviathan, who can stand before God? If Job dare not attempt to catch or subdue or play with this animal, how can he hope to compete with God in governing the universe? Following the question, the description returns to the beast in all the magnificence of his strength, and ends with a picture of men attempting to overcome him with sword, or spear, or dart, or pointed shaft; while all the while, in fierce anger, he holds the citadel of his being, and becomes king over all the sons of pride.
Thus the unveiling of God's own glory ends, not in the higher reaches of the spiritual, but in, its exhibition in a beast of the river and the field. It is not the method we would have adopted, but it is the perfect method. For the man who knows God it is necessary only to make his commonest knowledge flame with its true glory for him to learn the sublimest lesson of all.
From "An Exposition of the Whole Bible" by G. Campbell Morgan.
Job Chapter 41 Commentary
Chapter Outline
- Concerning Leviathan.
Verses 1-34
The description of the Leviathan, is yet further to convince Job of his own weakness, and of God's almighty power. Whether this Leviathan be a whale or a crocodile, is disputed. The Lord, having showed Job how unable he was to deal with the Leviathan, sets forth his own power in that mighty creature. If such language describes the terrible force of Leviathan, what words can express the power of God's wrath? Under a humbling sense of our own vileness, let us revere the Divine Majesty; take and fill our allotted place, cease from our own wisdom, and give all glory to our gracious God and Saviour. Remembering from whom every good gift cometh, and for what end it was given, let us walk humbly with the Lord.
From the "Concise Commentary on the Bible" by Matthew Henry.