Go to Related Reading
About this book

Job

About this book
Chapter 41

1 “Can you pull in Leviathan with a hook and tie down its tongue with a rope?⁠ 2 Can you put a cord through its nose or pierce its jaw with a hook? 3 Will it make numerous supplications to you; will it speak to you with tender words? 4 Will it make a pact with you, so you could take it as your slave for life? 5 Can you play with it, like a bird, or tie it on a leash for your girls?⁠ 6 Will partners bargain for it? Will they divide it up among the merchants? 7 Can you fill its hide with harpoons or its head with fishing spears? 8 If you lay your hand on it, you will remember the fight. Do not do it again! 9 (41:1) See, his expectation is wrong; he is laid low even at the sight of it. 10 Is it not fierce when it is awakened? Who is he, then, who can stand before it? 11 Who has confronted me that I should repay?⁠ Everything under heaven belongs to me! 12 I will not keep silent about its limbs, and the extent of its might, and the grace of its arrangement. 13 Who can uncover its outer covering? Who can penetrate to the inside of its armor? 14 Who can open the doors of its mouth? Its teeth all around are fearsome. 15 Its back has rows of shields, shut up closely together as with a seal; 16 each one is so close to the next that no air can come between them. 17 They lock tightly together, one to the next; they cling together and cannot be separated. 18 Its snorting throws out flashes of light; its eyes are like the red glow of dawn. 19 Out of its mouth go flames; sparks of fire shoot forth! 20 Smoke streams from its nostrils as from a boiling pot over burning rushes. 21 Its breath sets coals ablaze, and a flame shoots from its mouth. 22 Strength lodges in its neck, and despair runs before it. 23 The folds of its flesh are tightly joined; they are firm on it, immovable. 24 Its heart is hard as rock, hard as a lower millstone. 25 When it rises up, the mighty are terrified;⁠ at its thrashing about they withdraw. 26 Whoever strikes it with a sword will have no effect, nor with the spear, arrow, or dart. 27 It regards iron as straw and bronze as rotten wood. 28 Arrows do not make it flee; slingstones become like chaff to it. 29 A club is counted as a piece of straw; it laughs at the rattling of the lance. 30 Its underparts are the sharp points of potsherds; it leaves its mark in the mud like a threshing sledge. 31 It makes the deep boil like a cauldron and stirs up the sea like a pot of ointment, 32 It leaves a glistening wake behind it; one would think the deep had a head of white hair. 33 The likes of it is not on earth, a creature without fear. 34 It looks on every haughty being; it is king over all that are proud.”

Texts in conversation

Compare Enuma Elish I and Job 41:25

Ancient Near East, Babylonian · Hebrew Bible

Share:

Summary

In Enuma Elish, the goddess Tiamat makes monsters so terrifying that anyone who sees them dies of fear and no one can fight them off. Job describes Leviathan the same way, a creature so frightening that even warriors back away when it rises.

Passages

Enuma Elish I

Ancient Near East, Babylonian · The Seven Tablets of Creation
[With poison instead of] blood she filled [their] bodies. Fierce [monster-vipers] she clothed with terror, [With splendour] she decked them, [she made them] of lofty stature. [Whoever saw] them, terror overcame him, Their bodies reared up and none could withstand [their attack]. [She set] up vipers, and dragons, and the (monster) [Lahamu], [And hurricanes], and raging hounds, and scorpion-men, And mighty [tempests], and fish-men, and [rams]; [They bore] cruel weapons, without fear of [the fight]. Her commands [were mighty], [none] could resist them;
1800–1750 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in the Enuma Elish

Job 41:25

Hebrew Bible
24 Its heart is hard as rock, hard as a lower millstone. 25 When it rises up, the mighty are terrified; at its thrashing about they withdraw. 26 Whoever strikes it with a sword will have no effect, nor with the spear, arrow, or dart. 27 It regards iron as straw and bronze as rotten wood. 28 Arrows do not make it flee; slingstones become like chaff to it. 29 A club is counted as a piece of straw; it laughs at the rattling of the lance. 30 Its underparts are the sharp points of potsherds; it leaves its mark in the mud like a threshing sledge. 31 It makes the deep boil like a cauldron and stirs up the sea like a pot of ointment, 32 It leaves a glistening wake behind it; one would think the deep had a head of white hair. 33 The likes of it is not on earth, a creature without fear. 34 It looks on every haughty being; it is king over all that are proud.”
500–401 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Job

References

“... representing a very ancient understanding of God’s sovereign role in maintaining order in the universe. In Psalm 77:17-20 the waters writhe and shudder when they see the LORD (compare Psalm 114:1-8). Psalm 89:9-10 recounts God’s rule and conquest over the chaotic waters, stilling the “raging sea,” here called “Rahab” (compare Psalm 65:7). Isaiah 51:9 recounts that God had pierced and cut Rahab, here clearly a serpentine sea monster, to pieces, like Marduk did to Tiamat. The serpentine monster also appears as the Leviathan, which God must control or destroy. Psalm 74:14 depicts God crushing the Leviathan. Job 41 presents the Leviathan as a fierce fire-breathing dragon, which only God can control (compare Job 3:8). Isaiah 27:1 states that God will defeat the sea monster to create and maintain lawful order. ...”
Jared C. Calaway, “Heavenly Sabbath, Heavenly Sanctuary: The Transformation of Priestly Sacred Space and Sacred Time in the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice and the Epistle to the Hebrews” (PhD diss., Columbia University, 2010), 81.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

Tags

Your feedback

Enuma Elish I and Job 41:25

Leave a comment

Your questions and comments are welcome!

Comments

Glossary

Search the Library