Old Testament · Poetry and wisdom

Job chapter 41

Can you haul in on a fishhook or tie his tongue down with a rope?Can you thread a cord through his nose or punch a hook through his jaw?Is he going to ? Is he going to talk to you in a soft voice?Will he with you and let you keep him as a slave for life?Will you play with him like a pet bird or put him on a leash for your girls?Will traders haggle over him and split him up among the ?Can you fill his hide with harpoons or his head with fishing spears?Lay a hand on him once. You will remember the fight. You will not try it twice.Look — any of taking him is a lie. The sight of him alone knocks a man flat.No one is fierce enough to . So who is going to stand up in front of me?Who has handed me anything first, so that I owe him? Everything under the sky is already mine.I am not going to keep quiet about his limbs, his raw strength, the grace of the way he is built.Who has ever peeled off his outer coat? Who would walk up to him with a bridle?Who can pry open the doors of his face? The ring of his teeth is pure .His back is rows of shields, sealed shut and packed tight.Each one presses so close to the next that no air gets between them.They cling to each other, locked together, and nothing pulls them apart.When he sneezes, light flashes. His eyes are lifting.Torches come out of his mouth. Sparks of fire go leaping out.Smoke pours from his nostrils like a pot boiling hard over burning reeds.His breath sets coals on fire. Flame comes out of his mouth.Strength sleeps in his neck. Dread goes dancing out ahead of him.The folds of his flesh hold tight, cast solid onto him, and they do not shift.His heart is cast hard as rock, hard as .When he heaves himself up, even the mighty are afraid. The crashing sends them staggering back.A sword that reaches him does not hold — not the spear, not the dart, not the javelin.Iron he counts as straw, bronze as rotted wood.No arrow makes him run. Slingstones turn to chaff against him.A club is stubble to him. He at the rattle of a spear.His underside is jagged pottery. He drags a threshing sledge across the mud.He makes boil like a pot, churns the sea like a jar of ointment.He leaves a shining trail behind him. You would think the deep had gone white-haired.Nothing on earth is his equal — a creature made with .He looks down on everything tall. He is king over .