Job 41:5

41:5 Can you play ¹  with it, like a bird,

or tie it on a leash ²  for your girls?

Job 38:31

38:31 Can you tie the bands ³  of the Pleiades,

or release the cords of Orion?

Job 39:10

39:10 Can you bind the wild ox ⁴  to a furrow with its rope,

will it till the valleys, following after you?

[41:5]  ¹ tn The Hebrew verb is שָׂחַק (sakhaq, “to sport; to trifle; to play,” Ps 104:26).

[41:5]  ² tn The idea may include putting Leviathan on a leash. D. W. Thomas suggested on the basis of an Arabic cognate that it could be rendered “tie him with a string like a young sparrow” (VT 14 [1964]: 114ff.).

[38:31]  ³ tn This word is found here and in 1 Sam 15:32. Dhorme suggests, with others, that there has been a metathesis (a reversal of consonants), and it is the same word found in Job 31:36 (“bind”). G. R. Driver takes it as “cluster” without changing the text (“Two astronomical passages in the Old Testament,” JTS 7 [1956] :3).

[39:10]  ⁵ tn Some commentators think that the addition of the “wild ox” here is a copyist’s error, making the stich too long. They therefore delete it. Also, binding an animal to the furrow with ropes is unusual. So with a slight emendation Kissane came up with “Will you bind him with a halter of cord?” While the MT is unusual, the sense is understandable, and no changes, even slight ones, are absolutely necessary.