His bones are tubes of bronze, his limbs like bars of iron.
God answers Job by describing an animal — its loins, its tail, and here its bones. What does He want a suffering man to learn from a skeleton of bronze and iron?
Which creature is this
Commentators have long debated what behemoth is. One reading takes it as a river-ox:
William Kelly"Behemoth" means what is called the hippopotamus. We ought not to call it a river-horse at all, which is what "hippopotamus" means. It is a river-ox. It looks more like an ox than a horse, with its own odd features, and they are very odd... Many insist that "behemoth" means an elephant. But read the account and you will see it is very unlike an elephant, apart from being a big creature with enormous strength. Beyond that, nothing.
Another writer thinks no living animal fits:
Leslie M. GrantSome have thought this refers to a hippopotamus, but that animal has a small tail, while behemoth "moves his tail like a cedar" (v.17). Perhaps this animal has now become extinct, for its tail seems to resemble that of a dinosaur.
Bones of bronze
The metal named here carries a settled meaning across Scripture:
Samuel RidoutThese verses, and others we could add, make the symbolic meaning of the copper clear. It stands for durability, strength, and refusal to bend, whether in protection, in chains, or in war. Applied to the nature of God, it would declare His unchanging character, His strength, and the impossibility of escaping His judgment. On the other side, it would declare the safety of those He protects.
Note: older translations call this metal "brass" or "copper"; the ESV reads "bronze."
Armoured, yet a grass-eater
The body is built for power, yet the diet is grass:
William KellyHuge as behemoth is, he eats plants like the ox. The elephant is vulnerable underneath, but here the sinews are of surpassing strength. He bends his tail like a cedar. The sinews of his thighs are knit tightly together, and his bones are like copper and iron. Yet, masterpiece as he is of God's ways, he has only a scythe-like tooth to graze the mountains, where all the beasts of the field play.
Strength with an owner
Verse 18 belongs to a list running from loins to tail to bones. That list leads to a title in verse 19, and to a limit on it:
Leslie M. GrantIn behemoth every part of his body added to his exceptional strength (vv.16-18): his loins, his body, legs and bones and even his tail. Strikingly, the text says, "he is the first of the ways of God" (v.19). God has created him as an object lesson for us of resistless strength. Only the God who made him can bring him down to nothing.
Power that serves nobody
All that strength raises a question: what is it for?
Samuel RidoutIn other words, he is an untamable, uncontrollable beast. He is of no use for man's service. The entire description gives the impression of absolute power used for utterly selfish ends. It lives for itself, refusing to yield its strength to the service of others.
The mirror held up to Job
This lesson in anatomy has a target — the man listening:
Samuel RidoutAnd yet he is only a creature. God gave him superhuman strength for His own all-wise purposes. Let Job look at this creature, self-sufficient and unstoppable. Let everyone tempted to trust his own strength look too — strength of body, as here, or of heart and mind. How small their own arm will seem.
Some go further. They read the beast as a picture of something worse than animal pride, though only as a suggestion:
Samuel RidoutSome have thought this creature must picture Satan, chief among God's creatures (Ezek. 28), outstanding in strength and pride... "It seems likely that behemoth stands for the Evil One at work in the animal and fleshly parts of man's own make-up, and that leviathan pictures the Evil One at work as man's enemy outside him. Behemoth is the enemy within us; leviathan is the enemy without us."
Summary
- Made — behemoth is God's creature; commentators differ on whether it is a river-ox, a hippopotamus, or an animal now extinct.
- Metal — bronze and iron speak of durability and strength; this frame will not bend.
- Chief — every part, down to the tail, adds strength, so that he heads God's works — yet only his Maker can bring him down.
- Useless — all that power serves itself alone. It yields nothing to anyone. That is strength at its most worthless.
- Mirror — Job, and everyone trusting his own strength of body or mind, should look at those iron limbs and see how small his own arm is.