For his shade the lotus trees cover him; the willows of the brook surround him.
God answers Job out of the storm. He does not explain his suffering. Instead He gives a long look at one animal — a huge beast He calls behemoth. The beast lies at ease in the shade of the lotus trees, and the willows of the brook close round him. Why does God answer a broken man's questions with a picture of a beast at rest, and what was Job supposed to see in it?
The creature in view
The verse names marsh plants — lotus and willow — so the beast belongs in wet ground by a stream. One writer reads that setting, and the animal's diet of grass, and calls him a river-ox rather than a river-horse, the hippopotamus others proposed.
William Kelly"Behold now behemoth, which I made with you" — when I made you I made him. "He eats grass as an ox." I have, therefore, good reason for saying that it is a river-ox, and not at all a river-horse... "The mountains yield food for him" — he can go to the mountain if he likes, or stay near it — "where all the beasts of the field play. He lies under the shady trees" — that is where he loves to be — "in the cover of the reeds and the marsh."
Commentators differ. Another writer looks at the size of the tail and suggests the animal may no longer exist.
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.
Ease without fear
The trees of the verse form a canopy over a creature at ease. Under it he feeds, harms nobody unless provoked, and fears nothing.
Samuel RidoutHis Creator gave him sharp, sword-like teeth, and he mows down the grass like an ox. He is harmless too when not roused, for the other beasts play in the same pasture. He lies down in the shade, taking his ease; for he fears nothing, even if a raging flood should seek to engulf him.
That untroubled rest has another side. Ask what use the animal is to anyone.
Leslie M. GrantSo no one can tame him or control him. Man could do nothing with him as he does with an ox or a horse. Also he was totally selfish: he was of no service to any man or animal. Would Job want to be like this, strong and self-confident, with no real aim of helping anyone?
Why God points to an animal
Readers easily stop at the wonder of the creature itself. God's aim runs the other way.
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 who made them? 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 mirror held up to pride
Job had been defending himself. God sets this beast, lying safe in the shade, beside Job as a measure of his own strength.
Samuel RidoutAnd yet he is but a creature, endowed by God, for His all-wise purposes, with superhuman strength. Let Job look hard 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 puny will their own arm appear.
One writer goes further and reads the beast as a picture of pride.
Samuel RidoutTo Job, behemoth would stand for that creature of pride which flourishes among the professed people of God. Self-righteousness, self-seeking, pride of conduct or of character, denies its need of Christ and of God. Such is sin in the flesh — incorrigible and hideous. Who can subdue it or change its nature?
What it produced in Job
The proof that the lesson landed is Job's own reply at the end. Studying the animal was never going to produce it.
William Kelly"I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you." It was nothing external now; no mere distant rumour... Do you think that searching into the structure or habits of behemoth and leviathan would have led to anything of the sort? Certainly not. He had to do with God Himself, who used them for the express purpose, and had thereby turned Job from all to Himself.
Summary
- Shade. The lotus trees and willows shelter a beast lying at ease, afraid of nothing, not even a raging flood.
- Strength. That fearlessness rests on power no man can tame; no one puts him to work like an ox or a horse.
- Selfishness. Yet all that strength serves no one. The beast lives for itself.
- Mirror. God points Job, tempted to trust his own strength of body and mind, to this beast — and Job's own arm looks tiny.
- Sight. The creature was never the destination. God used it to turn Job from himself, until Job said his eye now saw God.