Will you play with him as with a bird? Or will you bind him for your girls?
Parallel Translations
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Will you play with him as with a bird? Or will you bind him for your girls?
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Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens?
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(40-29) Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? Or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens?
Cross-references (2)
Passages linked to Job 41:5 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Judges 16:25-30 When their hearts were merry, they said, “Call for Samson, that he may entertain us.” They called for Samson out of the prison; and he performed before them. They set him between the pillars; and Samson said to the boy who held him by the hand, “Allow me to feel the pillars on which the house rests, that I may lean on them.” Now the house was full of men and women; and all the lords of the Philistines were there; and there were on the roof about three thousand men and women, who saw while Samson performed. Samson called to Yahweh, and said, “Lord Yahweh, remember me, please, and strengthen me, please, only this once, God, that I may be at once avenged of the Philistines for my two eyes.” Samson took hold of the two middle pillars on which the house rested and leaned on them, the one with his right hand and the other with his left. Samson said, “Let me die with the Philistines!” He bowed himself with all his might; and the house fell on the lords, and on all the people who were in it. So the dead that he killed at his death were more than those who he killed in his life.
- Job 28:11 He binds the streams that they don’t trickle. The thing that is hidden he brings out to light.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (10 sources)
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Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain Who dare look in his mouth?
Who dare look in his mouth?
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Job 41:5 Wilt thou play with him as [with]…
Job 41:5 Wilt thou play with him as [with] a bird? or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens?
Ver. 5. Wilt thou play with him as with a bird?] Shall he make thee sport, as those poor birds that serve as pastime for little children? Or as the foolish Emperor Honorius delighted in his bird Roma (so he called it), at the loss whereof, when the city was taken by the Vandals, he grieved more than at all the rest? Indignum sane, regem aves praeferre viribus, saith the divine chronologer.
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Wilt thou bind him for thy maidens?] Shall your daughters tie him with a thread, which, lengthening or strengthening at their discretion, shall make his prison either larger or straiter?
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain As with a bird; as children play with little…
As with a bird; as children play with little birds kept in cages, or tied with strings, which they do at their pleasure, and without any fear?
For thy maidens; for thy little daughters; which he mentions rather than little sons, because such are most subject to fear.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Wilt thou play with him as with a bird?....…
Wilt thou play with him as with a bird?.... In the hand or cage: leviathan plays in the sea, but there is no playing with him by land, Psa 104:26;
or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens? or young girls, as Mr. Broughton renders it; tie him in a string, as birds are for children to play with? Now, though crocodiles are very pernicious to children, and often make a prey of them when they approach too near the banks of the Nile, or whenever they have an opportunity of seizing them (k); yet there is an instance of the child of an Egyptian woman that was brought up with one, and used to play with it (l), though, when grown up, was killed by it; but no such instance can be given of the whale of any sort.
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(k) Aelian. l. 10. c. 21. (l) Maxim. Tyr. Sermon. 38.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 5. Wilt thou play with him] Is he…
Verse 5. Wilt thou play with him] Is he such a creature as thou canst tame; and of which thou canst make a pet, and give as a plaything to thy little girls? נערותיך naarotheycha; probably alluding to the custom of catching birds, tying a string to their legs, and giving them to children to play with; a custom execrable as ancient, and disgraceful as modern.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain Wilt thou play with him as with a bird?…
Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? - A bird that is tamed. The art of taming birds was doubtless early practiced, and they were kept for amusement. But the leviathan could not thus be tamed.
Or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens? - For their amusement. For such purposes doubtless, birds were caught and caged. There is great force in this question, on the supposition that the crocodile is intended. Nothing could be more incongruous than the idea of securing so rough and unsightly a monster for the amusement of tender and delicate females.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain a bird?--that is, tamed.
a bird?--that is, tamed.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 5. As with a bird — Catullus (ii, 1)…
5. As with a bird — Catullus (ii, 1) speaks of “the sparrow, the delight of my girl.” Generically, the crocodile was probably the most untamable of animals, and yet even they have now and then been tamed to do the will of man. A Roman statue now in the British Museum represents an Egyptian tumbler performing on the back of a crocodile, as exhibited in the theatre at Rome. See note on Job_3:8; and Sharpe’s Bible Texts, page 96.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 5. Wilt thou make a pet thing of him?…
5. Wilt thou make a pet thing of him? The commentators quote Catullus, passer, deliciœ meœ puellœ.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain Wilt thou play with him as with a bird?…
Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? The Egyptians were especially fond of pet animals, and Job"s countrymen, it may be assumed, were the same. Besides dogs, we find the Egyptians keeping tame antelopes, leopards, and monkeys. A tame crocodile would certainly seem to be an extraordinary pet, but Herodotus says that the Egyptians tamed them (2:39), and Sir Gardner Wilkinson informed me that he had known some tame ones at Cairo. The Mesopotamian Arabs domesticate falcons to assist them in the chase of the bustard and the gazelle (Layard, "Nineveh and Babylon," pp. 481-483). And this usage, though not represented on the Assyrian monuments, is likely to have been ancient. Or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens? i.e. Wilt thou so secure him that he may be delivered over to thy handmaidens, to be made their pet and playfellow?
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.