Job 41:1-34
41 “Can you draw out Le·viʹa·than*+ with a fishhook,Or with a rope can you hold down its tongue?
2 Can you put a rush in its nostrils,+Or with a thorn can you bore its jaws?
3 Will it make many entreaties to you,Or will it say soft words to you?
4 Will it conclude a covenant with you,That you may take it as a slave to time indefinite?
5 Will you play with it as with a bird,Or will you tie it for your young girls?
6 Will partners barter for it?*Will they divide it up among tradesmen?*
7 Will you fill its skin with harpoons,+Or its head with fish spears?
8 Put your hand upon it.Remember the battle. Do not do it again.*
9 Look! One’s expectation about it will certainly be disappointed.One will also be hurled down at the mere sight of it.
10 None is so audacious that he should stir it up.And who is it that can hold his ground before me?+
11 Who has given me something first, that I ought to reward him?+Under the whole heavens it is mine.+
12 I shall not keep silent about its partsOr the matter of [its] mightiness and the grace of its proportions.
13 Who has uncovered the face of its clothing?Into its double jaw* who will enter?
14 The doors of its face* who has opened?Its teeth round about are frightful.
15 Furrows of scales are its haughtiness,Closed as with a tight seal.
16 One to the other they fit closely,And not even air can come in between them.
17 Each one to the other* they are stuck together;They grasp one another and cannot be separated.
18 Its very sneezings flash forth light,And its eyes are like the beams of dawn.
19 Out of its mouth there go lightning flashes,Even sparks of fire make their escape.
20 Out of its nostrils smoke goes forth,Like a furnace set aflame even with rushes.
21 Its soul* itself sets coals ablaze,And even a flame goes forth out of its mouth.
22 In its neck lodges strength,And before it despair leaps.*
23 The folds of its flesh do cling together;They are as a casting upon it, immovable.
24 Its heart is cast like stone,Yes, cast like a lower millstone.
25 Due to its rising up the strong get frightened;+Due to consternation they get bewildered.
26 Overtaking it, the sword itself does not prove equal,Nor spear, dart or arrowhead.+
27 It regards iron+ as mere straw,Copper as mere rotten wood.
28 An arrow* does not chase it away;The slingstones+ have been changed for it into mere stubble.
29 A club has been regarded [by it] as mere stubble,+And it laughs at the rattling of a javelin.
30 As pointed earthenware fragments* are its underparts;It spreads out a threshing instrument+ upon the mire.
31 It causes the depths to boil just like a pot;It makes the very sea like an ointment pot.
32 Behind itself it makes a pathway shine;*One would regard the watery deep as gray-headedness.*
33 Upon the dust there is not the like of it,The one made to be without terror.
34 Everything high it sees.It is king over all majestic wild beasts.”*
Footnotes
^ “Leviathan,” M(Heb., liw·ya·thanʹ)Vg; LXX, “a dragon.”
^ Or, “make a feast over it.”
^ Lit., “Canaanites.” Heb., kena·ʽanimʹ.
^ MLXX end chapter 40 here.
^ Lit., “bridle,” M; LXX, “scale armor [coat of mail].”
^ “Face,” M; Sy, “mouth.”
^ Lit., “to its brother.”
^ “Its soul.” Heb., naph·shohʹ; Gr., psy·kheʹ.
^ “Despair leaps,” M; LXX, “destruction runs.”
^ Lit., “A son of a bow.”
^ Or, “The most pointed (sharpest) of earthenware fragments,” according to the Heb. idiom.
^ “And the Tartarus of the abyss as a captive,” LXX. See App 4D.
^ “As gray-headedness,” M; LXX, “as a place to walk”; Sy, “as the dry land.”
^ Lit., “all the sons of pride (dignity).”
