41:1 "Can you pull in the leviathan with a fishhook or tie down his tongue with a rope?

41:2 Can you put a cord through his nose or pierce his jaw with a hook?

41:3 Will he keep begging you for mercy? Will he speak to you with gentle words?

41:4 Will he make an agreement with you for you to take him as your slave for life?

41:5 Can you make a pet of him like a bird or put him on a leash for your girls?

41:6 Will traders barter for him? Will they divide him up among the merchants?

41:7 Can you fill his hide with harpoons or his head with fishing spears?

41:8 If you lay a hand on him, you will remember the struggle and never do it again!

41:9 Any hope of subduing him is false; the mere sight of him is overpowering.

41:10 No one is fierce enough to rouse him. Who then is able to stand against me?

41:11 Who has a claim against me that I must pay? Everything under heaven belongs to me.

41:12 "I will not fail to speak of his limbs, his strength and his graceful form.

41:13 Who can strip off his outer coat? Who would approach him with a bridle?

41:14 Who dares open the doors of his mouth, ringed about with his fearsome teeth?

41:15 His back has rows of shields tightly sealed together;

41:16 each is so close to the next that no air can pass between.

41:17 They are joined fast to one another; they cling together and cannot be parted.

41:18 His snorting throws out flashes of light; his eyes are like the rays of dawn.

41:19 Firebrands stream from his mouth; sparks of fire shoot out.

41:20 Smoke pours from his nostrils as from a boiling pot over a fire of reeds.

41:21 His breath sets coals ablaze, and flames dart from his mouth.

41:22 Strength resides in his neck; dismay goes before him.

41:23 The folds of his flesh are tightly joined; they are firm and immovable.

41:24 His chest is hard as rock, hard as a lower millstone.

41:25 When he rises up, the mighty are terrified; they retreat before his thrashing.

41:26 The sword that reaches him has no effect, nor does the spear or the dart or the javelin.

41:27 Iron he treats like straw and bronze like rotten wood.

41:28 Arrows do not make him flee; slingstones are like chaff to him.

41:29 A club seems to him but a piece of straw; he laughs at the rattling of the lance.

41:30 His undersides are jagged potsherds, leaving a trail in the mud like a threshing sledge.

41:31 He makes the depths churn like a boiling caldron and stirs up the sea like a pot of ointment.

41:32 Behind him he leaves a glistening wake; one would think the deep had white hair.

41:33 Nothing on earth is his equal--a creature without fear.

41:34 He looks down on all that are haughty; he is king over all that are proud."