Under the lotus plants he lies, in the shelter of the reeds and in the marsh.
Job 40 closes with God pointing Job to a single animal and describing, in detail, where it chooses to lie down. Job had spent chapters defending himself, and God answers by describing a beast at rest in the reeds — a creature Job could never subdue.
The creature in view
Commentators differ over which animal behemoth is. One of them tests the usual candidates against the description itself:
William Kelly"Behemoth" means what is called the hippopotamus. It ought not to be called a river-horse at all, which is what "hippopotamus" means. It is a river-ox. It is like an ox rather than a horse... Many insist that "behemoth" means an elephant. But read the account and you will see it is very unlike an elephant. It is a big creature with enormous strength, and beyond that, nothing.
Where he chooses to lie
A beast this size could sleep anywhere. God notes the low, shaded ground he prefers:
William KellyHe does not love to lie down on high ground. He lies under the lotus plants, where the reed and the marsh give him cover. The lotuses shade him, and so do the willows. No swelling floods startle him. He waits calmly even for a Jordan rushing at his mouth.
Rest without fear
Two things make that rest possible. He is fed, and nothing around him counts as a threat:
Leslie M. GrantGod has supplied food for him as well (v. 20), and he could lie down with nothing at all to fear, even though other beasts were all around him. He is the very picture of self-confident power. Even the river may rage while he is at peace (v. 23).
Strength that serves no one
That calm has a dark side. This animal spends all its power on itself.
Samuel RidoutIn other words, he is an untamable, uncontrollable beast. He is of no use for man's service. The whole description gives one impression: absolute power spent on completely selfish ends. It lives for itself, refusing to yield its strength to the service of others.
Job cannot master this beast. Yet one thing is harder still to bring down:
F. B. HoleHe called Job's attention to behemoth and to leviathan — probably the hippopotamus and the crocodile. They had brute strength but no human intelligence. It would be more easy to subdue them than to bring down proud man.
The point aimed at Job
God does not display this picture for admiration. He holds it up against the man who had been arguing his case with Him.
Samuel RidoutAnd yet he is only a creature. God gave him this more-than-human strength for His own all-wise purposes. Let Job look at this creature, self-sufficient and unstoppable. Let everyone tempted to trust in his own strength look at it too — strength of body, as here, or of heart and mind. How weak their own arm will look.
Shame is not the only result. The God who can do everything has also taken trouble over man:
William KellyTo an upright mind like Job's, these descriptions were well suited to overwhelm him. He who could do everything had stooped to make man the object of His ways on earth. He ordered all things to shape man into submission of heart to Himself... Job therefore should be deeply ashamed of his self-sufficiency.
Not a nature lesson
These chapters are often read as a celebration of wildlife. That misses what the description was for:
William KellyMen talk as if God's object was merely to occupy us with His works. God does the opposite. He brings forward His works to turn us away from our own thoughts and bow us to Himself. If the works of God are so wonderful, who is He that did the work? And what is man, if he dares to judge such a God?... Do you think that after this Job was occupied with behemoth or with leviathan? Not at all, but with God; and this was the design of it all.
A figure of pride
Some writers go further and read the beast as a picture of evil itself. They hold it as a possibility, not a settled reading:
Samuel RidoutSome have thought this creature must stand for Satan, as the chief of God's creatures, 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. Leviathan pictures the same Evil One at work as an enemy from outside. Behemoth is the enemy within us; leviathan is the enemy without us."
Summary
- Setting — He does not pick the high ground. He lies down under the lotus shade, screened by reed and marsh, undisturbed even when the river floods.
- Ease — That rest is the whole portrait: fed, surrounded by other beasts, and afraid of nothing. Self-confident power at rest.
- Selfishness — The same strength is untamable and useless to anyone. It refuses to serve anyone else.
- Mirror — Job must weigh his own arm against a creature he cannot subdue. And proud man is harder to bring down than that beast.
- Aim — The description is not given so we study the animal, but so we stop studying ourselves. Job ended up occupied with God, not with behemoth.