NET Bible | New Living Translation |
1"Can you pull in Leviathan with a hook, and tie down its tongue with a rope? | 1 “Can you catch Leviathan with a hook or put a noose around its jaw? |
2Can you put a cord through its nose, or pierce its jaw with a hook? | 2Can you tie it with a rope through the nose or pierce its jaw with a spike? |
3Will it make numerous supplications to you, will it speak to you with tender words? | 3Will it beg you for mercy or implore you for pity? |
4Will it make a pact with you, so you could take it as your slave for life? | 4Will it agree to work for you, to be your slave for life? |
5Can you play with it, like a bird, or tie it on a leash for your girls? | 5Can you make it a pet like a bird, or give it to your little girls to play with? |
6Will partners bargain for it? Will they divide it up among the merchants? | 6Will merchants try to buy it to sell it in their shops? |
7Can you fill its hide with harpoons or its head with fishing spears? | 7Will its hide be hurt by spears or its head by a harpoon? |
8If you lay your hand on it, you will remember the fight, and you will never do it again! | 8If you lay a hand on it, you will certainly remember the battle that follows. You won’t try that again! |
9See, his expectation is wrong, he is laid low even at the sight of it. | 9 No, it is useless to try to capture it. The hunter who attempts it will be knocked down. |
10Is it not fierce when it is awakened? Who is he, then, who can stand before it? | 10And since no one dares to disturb it, who then can stand up to me? |
11(Who has confronted me that I should repay? Everything under heaven belongs to me!) | 11Who has given me anything that I need to pay back? Everything under heaven is mine. |
12I will not keep silent about its limbs, and the extent of its might, and the grace of its arrangement. | 12“I want to emphasize Leviathan’s limbs and its enormous strength and graceful form. |
13Who can uncover its outer covering? Who can penetrate to the inside of its armor? | 13Who can strip off its hide, and who can penetrate its double layer of armor? |
14Who can open the doors of its mouth? Its teeth all around are fearsome. | 14Who could pry open its jaws? For its teeth are terrible! |
15Its back has rows of shields, shut up closely together as with a seal; | 15The scales on its back are like rows of shields tightly sealed together. |
16each one is so close to the next that no air can come between them. | 16They are so close together that no air can get between them. |
17They lock tightly together, one to the next; they cling together and cannot be separated. | 17Each scale sticks tight to the next. They interlock and cannot be penetrated. |
18Its snorting throws out flashes of light; its eyes are like the red glow of dawn. | 18“When it sneezes, it flashes light! Its eyes are like the red of dawn. |
19Out of its mouth go flames, sparks of fire shoot forth! | 19Lightning leaps from its mouth; flames of fire flash out. |
20Smoke streams from its nostrils as from a boiling pot over burning rushes. | 20Smoke streams from its nostrils like steam from a pot heated over burning rushes. |
21Its breath sets coals ablaze and a flame shoots from its mouth. | 21Its breath would kindle coals, for flames shoot from its mouth. |
22Strength lodges in its neck, and despair runs before it. | 22“The tremendous strength in Leviathan’s neck strikes terror wherever it goes. |
23The folds of its flesh are tightly joined; they are firm on it, immovable. | 23Its flesh is hard and firm and cannot be penetrated. |
24Its heart is hard as rock, hard as a lower millstone. | 24Its heart is hard as rock, hard as a millstone. |
25When it rises up, the mighty are terrified, at its thrashing about they withdraw. | 25When it rises, the mighty are afraid, gripped by terror. |
26Whoever strikes it with a sword will have no effect, nor with the spear, arrow, or dart. | 26No sword can stop it, no spear, dart, or javelin. |
27It regards iron as straw and bronze as rotten wood. | 27Iron is nothing but straw to that creature, and bronze is like rotten wood. |
28Arrows do not make it flee; slingstones become like chaff to it. | 28Arrows cannot make it flee. Stones shot from a sling are like bits of grass. |
29A club is counted as a piece of straw; it laughs at the rattling of the lance. | 29Clubs are like a blade of grass, and it laughs at the swish of javelins. |
30Its underparts are the sharp points of potsherds, it leaves its mark in the mud like a threshing sledge. | 30Its belly is covered with scales as sharp as glass. It plows up the ground as it drags through the mud. |
31It makes the deep boil like a cauldron and stirs up the sea like a pot of ointment, | 31“Leviathan makes the water boil with its commotion. It stirs the depths like a pot of ointment. |
32It leaves a glistening wake behind it; one would think the deep had a head of white hair. | 32The water glistens in its wake, making the sea look white. |
33The likes of it is not on earth, a creature without fear. | 33Nothing on earth is its equal, no other creature so fearless. |
34It looks on every haughty being; it is king over all that are proud." | 34Of all the creatures, it is the proudest. It is the king of beasts.” |
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