Job 41
The Description of Leviathan
41:1 (40:25)1 “Can you pull in2 Leviathan with a hook,
and tie down3 its tongue with a rope?
41:2 Can you put a cord through its nose,
or pierce its jaw with a hook?
41:3 Will it make numerous supplications to you,4
will it speak to you with tender words?5
41:4 Will it make a pact6 with you,
so you could take it7 as your slave for life?
41:5 Can you play8 with it, like a bird,
or tie it on a leash9 for your girls?
41:6 Will partners10 bargain11 for it?
Will they divide it up12 among the merchants?
41:7 Can you fill its hide with harpoons
or its head with fishing spears?
41:8 If you lay your hand on it,
you will remember13 the fight,
and you will never do it again!
41:9 (41:1)14 See, his expectation is wrong,15
he is laid low even at the sight of it.16
41:10 Is it not fierce17 when it is awakened?
Who is he, then, who can stand before it?18
41:11 (Who has confronted19 me that I should repay?20
Everything under heaven belongs to me!)21
41:12 I will not keep silent about its limbs,
and the extent of its might,
and the grace of its arrangement.22
41:13 Who can uncover its outer covering?23
Who can penetrate to the inside of its armor?24
41:14 Who can open the doors of its mouth?25
Its teeth all around are fearsome.
41:15 Its back26 has rows of shields,
shut up closely27 together as with a seal;
41:16 each one is so close to the next28
that no air can come between them.
41:17 They lock tightly together, one to the next;29
they cling together and cannot be separated.
41:18 Its snorting throws out flashes of light;
its eyes are like the red glow30 of dawn.
41:19 Out of its mouth go flames,31
sparks of fire shoot forth!
41:20 Smoke streams from its nostrils
as from a boiling pot over burning32 rushes.
41:21 Its breath sets coals ablaze
and a flame shoots from its mouth.
41:22 Strength lodges in its neck,
and despair33 runs before it.
41:23 The folds34 of its flesh are tightly joined;
they are firm on it, immovable.35
41:24 Its heart36 is hard as rock,
hard as a lower millstone.
41:25 When it rises up, the mighty are terrified,
at its thrashing about they withdraw.37
41:26 Whoever strikes it with a sword38
will have no effect,39
nor with the spear, arrow, or dart.
41:27 It regards iron as straw
and bronze as rotten wood.
41:28 Arrows40 do not make it flee;
slingstones become like chaff to it.
41:29 A club is counted41 as a piece of straw;
it laughs at the rattling of the lance.
41:30 Its underparts42 are the sharp points of potsherds,
it leaves its mark in the mud
like a threshing sledge.43
41:31 It makes the deep boil like a cauldron
and stirs up the sea like a pot of ointment,44
41:32 It leaves a glistening wake behind it;
one would think the deep had a head of white hair.
41:33 The likes of it is not on earth,
a creature45 without fear.
41:34 It looks on every haughty being;
it is king over all that are proud.”46