not, however, terrify the behêmoth, which can live as well in the water as on the land; לא יחפּוז, properly, it does not spring up before it, is not disturbed by it. Instead of the Jordan, Job 40:23, especially in connection with יגיח, the ‘Gaihûn (the Oxus) or the ‘Gaihân (the Pyramus) might have been mentioned, which have their names from the growing force with which they burst forth from their sources (גּיח, גּוּח, comp. ‘gâcha, to wash away). But in order to express the notion of a powerful and at times deep-swelling stream, the poet prefers the ירדּן of his fatherland, which moreover, does not lie so very far from the scene, according to the conception at least, since all the wadis in its neighbourhood flow directly or indirectly (as Wâdi el-Meddân, the boundary river between the district of Suwêt and the Nukra plain) into the Jordan. For ירדּן (perhaps from ירד)[1] does not here signify a stream (rising in the mountain) in general; the name is not deprived of its geographical definiteness, but is a particularizing expression of the notion given above.
The description closes in Job 40:24 with the ironical challenge: in its sight (בּעיניו as Pro 1:17) let one (for once) catch it; let one lay a snare which, when it goes into it, shall spring together and pierce it in the nose; i.e., neither the open force nor the stratagem, which one employs with effect with other animals, is sufficient to overpower this monster. מוקשׁים is generally rendered as equal to חחים, Isa 37:29; Eze 19:4, or at least to the cords drawn through them, but contrary to the uniform usage of the language. The description of the hippopotamus[2] is not followed by that of the crocodile, which also elsewhere form a pair, e.g., in Achilles Tatius,
Page:03.BCOT.KD.HistoricalBooks.B.vol.3.LaterProphets.djvu/1802
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