Doth the eagle mount up at thy command, and make her nest on high?
Parallel translations
- WEB Is it at your command that the eagle mounts up, and makes his nest on high?
- BSB Does the eagle soar at your command and make his nest on high?
- NKJV Does the eagle mount up at your command, And make its nest on high?
- NASB “Is it at your command that the eagle flies high, And makes his nest on high?
- NLT Is it at your command that the eagle rises to the heights to make its nest?
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
God asks whether the eagle mounts high and nests on the heights at Job's command. The eagle's lofty ways answer to God alone.
Overview
The eagle soaring upward and building its nest on inaccessible cliffs does so by God's ordering, not Job's command. The rhetorical question presses the point that Job neither directs nor sustains the natural world. As the speech nears its climax, God keeps confronting Job with creatures whose existence and habits proclaim a wisdom and dominion that are God's alone.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Obad 1:4Though thou exalt thyself as the eagle, and though thou set thy nest among the stars, thence will I bring thee down, saith the LORD.
- Jer 49:16Thy terribleness hath deceived thee, and the pride of thine heart, O thou that dwellest in the clefts of the rock, that holdest the height of the hill: though thou shouldest make thy nest as high as the eagle, I will bring thee down from thence, saith the LORD.
- Exod 19:4Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles’ wings, and brought you unto myself.
- Prov 23:5Wilt thou set thine eyes upon that which is not? for riches certainly make themselves wings; they fly away as an eagle toward heaven.
- Lev 11:13And these are they which ye shall have in abomination among the fowls; they shall not be eaten, they are an abomination: the eagle, and the ossifrage, and the ospray,
- Ps 103:5Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things; so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle’s.
- Isa 40:31But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.
- Hos 8:1Set the trumpet to thy mouth. He shall come as an eagle against the house of the LORD, because they have transgressed my covenant, and trespassed against my law.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Commentaries & study tools
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
Job's cry for a mediator who can lay his hand on both God and man, and his confidence that 'my Redeemer lives' and will stand on the earth, reaches forward to Jesus the living Redeemer.
How Job 39:27 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.