The “furrow (תּלם, sulcus, not porca, the ridge between the furrows) of his cord” is that which it is said to break up by means of the ploughshare, being led by a rein. אחריך refers to the leader, who goes just before or at the side; according to Hahn, to one who has finished the sowing which precedes the harrowing; but it is more natural to imagine the leader of the animal that is harrowing, which is certainly not left to itself. On כּי, Job 39:12, as an exponent of the obj. vid., Ew. §336, b. The Chethib here uses the Kal שׁוּב transitively: to bring back (viz., that which was sown as harvested), which is possible (vid., Job 42:10). גרנך, Job 39:12, is either a locative (into thy threshing-floor) or acc. of the obj. per synecd. continentis pro contento, as Rth 3:2; Mat 3:12. The position of the question from beginning to end assumes an animal outwardly resembling the yoke-ox, as the ראם is also elsewhere put with the ox, Deu 33:17; Psa 29:6; Isa 34:7. But the conclusion at length arrived at by Hahn and in Gesenius' Handwörterbuch, that on this very account the buffalo is to be understood, is a mistake: A. oryx and leucoryx are both (for this very reason not distinguished by the ancients) entirely similar to the ox; they are not only ruminants, like the ox, with a like form of the hoof, but also of a plump form, which makes them appear to be of the ox tribe.
Verses 13-18
Job 39:13-18 13 The wing of the ostrich vibrates joyously,
Is she pious, wing and feather? 14 No, she leaveth her eggs in the earth
And broodeth over the dust, 15 Forgetting that a foot may crush them,
And the beast of the field trample them. 16 She treateth her young ones harshly as if they were not hers;
In vain is her labour, without her being distressed. 17 For Eloah hath caused her to forget wisdom,
And gave her no share of understanding.
