Job 40:15

The Description of Behemoth ¹ 

40:15 “Look now at Behemoth, ²  which I made as ³  I made you;

it eats grass like the ox.

Job 40:20-22

40:20 For the hills bring it food, ⁴ 

where all the wild animals play.

40:21 Under the lotus trees it lies,

in the secrecy of the reeds and the marsh.

40:22 The lotus trees conceal it in their ⁵  shadow;

the poplars by the stream conceal it.

Genesis 1:29-30

1:29 Then God said, “I now ⁶  give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the entire earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. ⁷  1:30 And to all the animals of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to all the creatures that move on the ground – everything that has the breath of life in it – I give ⁸  every green plant for food.” It was so.

Psalms 104:27-28

104:27 All of your creatures ⁹  wait for you

to provide them with food on a regular basis. ¹⁰ 

104:28 You give food to them and they receive it;

you open your hand and they are filled with food. ¹¹ 

Psalms 145:15-16

145:15 Everything looks to you in anticipation, ¹² 

and you provide them with food on a regular basis. ¹³ 

145:16 You open your hand,

and fill every living thing with the food they desire. ¹⁴ 

¹ sn The next ten verses are devoted to a portrayal of Behemoth (the name means “beast” in Hebrew). It does not fit any of the present material very well, and so many think the section is a later addition. Its style is more like that of a textbook. Moreover, if the animal is a real animal (the usual suggestion is the hippopotamus), then the location of such an animal is Egypt and not Palestine. Some have identified these creatures Behemoth and Leviathan as mythological creatures (Gunkel, Pope). Others point out that these creatures could have been dinosaurs (P. J. Maarten, NIDOTTE, 2:780; H. M. Morris, The Remarkable Record of Job, 115-22). Most would say they are real animals, but probably mythologized by the pagans. So the pagan reader would receive an additional impact from this point about God’s sovereignty over all nature.

² sn By form the word is the feminine plural of the Hebrew word for “beast.” Here it is an abstract word – a title.

³ tn Heb “with you.” The meaning could be temporal (“when I made you”) – perhaps a reference to the sixth day of creation (Gen 1:24).

⁴ tn The word בּוּל (bul) probably refers to food. Many take it as an abbreviated form of יְבוּל (yÿvul, “produce of the field”). The vegetation that is produced on the low hills is what is meant.

⁵ tn The suffix is singular, but must refer to the trees’ shade.

⁶ tn The text uses הִנֵּה (hinneh), often archaically translated “behold.” It is often used to express the dramatic present, the immediacy of an event – “Look, this is what I am doing!”

⁷ sn G. J. Wenham (Genesis [WBC], 1:34) points out that there is nothing in the passage that prohibits the man and the woman from eating meat. He suggests that eating meat came after the fall. Gen 9:3 may then ratify the postfall practice of eating meat rather than inaugurate the practice, as is often understood.

⁸ tn The phrase “I give” is not in the Hebrew text but has been supplied in the translation for clarification.

⁹ tn Heb “All of them.” The pronoun “them” refers not just to the sea creatures mentioned in vv. 25-26, but to all living things (see v. 24). This has been specified in the translation as “all of your creatures” for clarity.

¹⁰ tn Heb “to give their food in its time.”

¹¹ tn Heb “they are satisfied [with] good.”

¹² tn Heb “the eyes of all wait for you.”

¹³ tn Heb “and you give to them their food in its season” (see Ps 104:27).

¹⁴ tn Heb “[with what they] desire.”