to scratch · verb, hiphil imperfect, 1st person common singular
parts
בַּדָּ֑יוba.Dav
H907
a brag or lie · noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
power
גְּ֝בוּר֗וֹתge.vu.Rot
H1369
force (literally or figuratively) · noun, common feminine plural absolute
comely
וְחִ֣יןve.Chin
H2433
beauty · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular construct
proportion
עֶרְכּֽוֹer.Ko
H6187
a pile · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Genesis 1:25 And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Job 41:11–end
God, having in the foregoing verses shown Job how unable he was to deal with the leviathan, here sets forth his own power in that massy mighty creature. Here is,
I. God's sovereign dominion and independency laid down, Job 41:11. 1. That he is indebted to none of his creatures. If any pretend he is indebted to them, let them make their demand and prove their debt, and they shall receive it in full and not by composition: "Who has prevented me?" that is, "who has laid any obligations upon me by any services he has done me? Who can pretend to be before-hand with me? If any were, I would not long be behind-hand with them; I would soon repay them." The apostle quotes this for the silencing of all…
I will not conceal--a resumption of the description broken off by the digression, which formed an agreeable change.
his power--literally, "the way," that is, true proportion or expression of his strength (so Hebrew, Deu 19:4).
comely proportion--literally, "the comeliness of his structure" (his apparatus: so "suit of apparel" Jdg 17:10) [MAURER]. UMBREIT translates, "his armor." But that follows after.
Adam Clarke on Job 41:12
I will not conceal his parts - This is most certainly no just translation of the original. The Vulgate is to this effect: I will not spare him: nor yield to his powerful words, framed for the purpose of entreaty.
Mr. Good applies it to leviathan: -
"I cannot be confounded at his limbs and violence;
The strength and structure of his frame."
The Creator cannot be intimidated at the most formidable of his own works: man may and should tremble; God cannot.
John Gill on Job 41:12
I will not conceal his parts,.... The parts of the leviathan; or "his bars", the members of his body, which are like bars of iron:
nor his power; which is very great, whether of the crocodile or the whale:
nor his comely proportion; the symmetry of his body, and the members of it; which, though large, every part is in just proportion to each other.
The Church Fathers
I will not spare him, nor his mighty words, and framed for entreaty. 42. Who can think this, which he knows he has never read, that the devil is about to ask pardon for his faults? But perhaps that man, whom this Leviathan in the end of the world makes his peculiar vessel, (whom, as Paul attests, the Lord Jesus shall slay with the spirit of His mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of His coming,) [2 Thess, 2, 8] alarmed at the presence of such great majesty, because he is unable to exercise his strength, bends himself ['inclinatur'] to prayer. But this can be more fitly understood of his body, that is of all the wicked, who have recourse at last to words of supplication, because they now scorn to perform its deeds. Whence the Truth says in the Gospel, Last of all come also the other virgins, saying, Lord, Lord, open to us. [Matt. 25, 11] To whom it is immediately replied, Verily I say unto you, I know you not. [ib. 12] But when he is said to compose words mighty for entreaty, he urges us the more to understand at this time that which we have said of his body in time to come. 43. For there are some within Holy Church who offer to God long prayers, but have not the conduct of those who entreat. For they follow after heavenly promises in their petitions, but avoid them in their deeds. These sometimes feel even tears in their prayer, but when after the seasons of prayer pride has struck their mind, they immediately swell up with the haughtiness of high-mindedness; when avarice urges them, they frequently glow with the heat of covetous thought; when lust has tempted, they pant at once with unlawful desires; when anger has persuaded them, the flame of madness soon consumes their gentleness of mind. As we have said then, they both experience tears in prayer, and yet at the close of their prayers, when they are assaulted with the suggestions of sins, they remember not that they had wept for desire of the heavenly kingdom. Which Balaam openly stated concerning himself, who says, on beholding the tabernacles of the just, Let my soul die with the death of the just, and let my last end be like theirs. [Numb. 23, 10] But when the time of compunction passed, he gave counsel against the life of those, to whom he had asked to be made like even in death; and when he found an occasion of avarice, he immediately forgot whatever he had wished for himself in the way of…
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Leviathan · Nature and habits of — Nature and habits of
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
Keil & Delitzsch on Job 41:12-14
12 I will not keep silence about his members,
The proportion of his power and the comeliness of his structure.
13 Who could raise the front of his coat of mail?
Into his double teeth-who cometh therein?
14 The doors of his face-who openeth them?
Round about his teeth is terror.
The Ker לו authorized by the Masora assumes an interrogative rendering: as to it, should I be silent about its members (לו at the head of the clause, as Lev 7:7-9; Isa 9:2), - what perhaps might appear more poetic to many. החרישׁ (once, Job 11:3, to cause to keep silence) here, as usually: to be silent. בּדּיו, as Job 18:13. דּבר signifies the relation of the matter, a matter of fact, as דּברי, facts, Psa 65:4; Psa 10…
Unlike the peaceful Behemoth (40:15-24), Leviathan was menacing (see also 3:8; Pss 74:14; 104:26; Isa 27:1). Most commentators identify Leviathan with the crocodile, with its terrible jaws (Job 41:14) and armored hide (41:15-17, 23), thrashing the water (41:31-32). But Leviathan is a fire-breathing dragon (41:18-21) that wraps its coils around the sun to cause an eclipse (3:8-9). The background for Leviathan is the seven-headed sea monster that represents chaos in ancient Near Eastern mythology. In the biblical record, this unruly maritime monster is a frequent biblical image for chaos and wickedness, whose head the Lord crushes (Ps 74:14; Isa 27:1; cp. Job 9:13; 26:12; Ps 89:9-10; Isa 30:7;…
From his nostrils smoke goes forth like a bubbling pot on the fire, which raises smoke.
and an earthenware vessel ואגמן. Its interpretation is according to its context: an expression of an earthenware vessel, like a bubbling pot; according to the matter that is stated (Jer. 1:13): “I see a bubbling pot.”
