Job 39

¹ Say if thou knowest the time of the bringing forth of the wild goats of the rock,

and if thou hast marked the calving of the hinds:

² and if thou hast numbered the full months of their being with young,

and if thou hast relieved their pangs:

³ and hast reared their young without fear;

and wilt thou loosen their pangs?

⁴ Their young will break forth; they will be multiplied with offspring:

their young will go forth, and will not return to them.

⁵ And who is he that sent forth the wild ass free?

and who loosed his bands?

⁶ whereas I made his habitation the wilderness,

and the salt land his coverts.

⁷ He laugheth to scorn the multitude of the city,

and heareth not the chiding of the tax-gatherer.

⁸ He will survey the mountains as his pasture,

and he seeketh after every green thing.

⁹ And will the unicorn be willing to serve thee,

or to lie down at thy manger?

¹⁰ And wilt thou bind his yoke with thongs,

or will he plough furrows for thee in the plain?

¹¹ And dost thou trust him, because his strength is great?

and wilt thou commit thy works to him?

¹² And wilt thou believe that he will return to thee thy seed,

and bring it in to thy threshing-floor?

^{13 [1][2]}The peacock hath a beautiful wing:

if the stork and the ostrich conceive, it is worthy of notice,

¹⁴ for the ostrich will leave her eggs in the ground,

and warm them on the dust,

¹⁵ and hath forgotten that the foot will scatter them,

and the wild beasts of the field trample them.

¹⁶ She hath ^[3]hardened herself against her young ones, as though she bereaved not herself:

she laboureth in vain without fear.

¹⁷ For God hath ^[4]withheld wisdom from her,

and not given her a portion in understanding.

¹⁸ In her season she will lift herself on high;

she will scorn the horse and his rider.

¹⁹ Hast thou invested the horse with strength,

and clothed his neck with terror?

²⁰ And hast thou clad him in perfect armour,

and made his breast glorious with courage?

²¹ He paweth exulting in the plain,

and goeth forth in strength into the plain.

²² He laugheth to scorn ^[5]a weapon as he meeteth it,

and will by no means turn back from the sword.

²³ The bow and sword resound against him;

and his rage will ^[6]swallow up the ground:

²⁴ and he will not believe until the trumpet soundeth.

²⁵ And when the trumpet soundeth, he saith, Aha!

and afar off he smelleth the war with prancing and neighing.

²⁶ And doth the hawk remain steady by thy wisdom,

having spread out her wings unmoved, looking toward the region of the south?

²⁷ And doth the eagle rise at thy command,

and the vulture remain sitting over his nest,

²⁸ on a crag of a rock, and in a secret place?

²⁹ Thence he seeketh food,

his eyes observe from far.

³⁰ And his young ones roll themselves in blood,

and wherever the carcases may be, immediately they are found.

Notes

1. 39:13 The peacock hath a beautiful wing: Gr. a wing of delighted ones is the peacock ↩
2. τερπομένων. The LXX seem to have caught at the meaning of רנן jubilavit, from which comes the word here used רננים struthiones. νεέλασσα—Hebrew נעלסה, participle Niphal feminine of עלס laetatus est. ἀσίδα חסדה, ciconia νεσσα נוצה penna (query item struthiocamelus). “The peacock’s wing is proudly spread. Is the ostrich also, if it conceive, like the stork? For,” etc. The stork according to tradition being the pious bird, the ostrich the contrary.—Charles Pridham. ↩
3. 39:16 hath hardened herself against her young ones: or, hath cruelly rejected her young ones ↩
4. 39:17 withheld wisdom from her: Gr. caused wisdom to be silent to her ↩
5. 39:22 a weapon as he meeteth it: Vat. a king as he meeteth him ↩
6. 39:23 swallow up the ground: Gr. cause to vanish ↩