“Or do you have an arm like God, And can you thunder with a voice like His?
Parallel translations
- WEB Or do you have an arm like God? Can you thunder with a voice like him?
- KJV Hast thou an arm like God? or canst thou thunder with a voice like him?
- BSB Do you have an arm like God’s? Can you thunder with a voice like His?
- NKJV Have you an arm like God? Or can you thunder with a voice like His?
- NLT Are you as strong as God? Can you thunder with a voice like his?
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 Job possesses an arm and a voice like God's. Job lacks the power and majesty that belong to God alone.
Overview
With vivid imagery of God's mighty arm and thundering voice, the Lord exposes the vast gulf between himself and Job. The 'arm' and 'voice' symbolize divine power and authority. Job cannot rule the moral universe because he lacks the strength to do so. This drives Job toward humble dependence and points forward to Christ, the arm of the Lord revealed for salvation.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 11
- Ps 89:13You have a mighty arm. Your hand is strong, and your right hand is exalted.
- Job 37:4–5After it a voice roars. He thunders with the voice of his majesty. He doesn’t hold back anything when his voice is heard.
- Job 9:4God who is wise in heart, and mighty in strength: who has hardened himself against him, and prospered?
- Job 23:6Would he contend with me in the greatness of his power? No, but he would listen to me.
- Job 33:12–13“Behold, I will answer you. In this you are not just, for God is greater than man.
- 1 Cor 10:22Or do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than he?
- Ps 89:10You have broken Rahab in pieces, like one of the slain. You have scattered your enemies with your mighty arm.
- Ps 39:3–9My heart was hot within me. While I meditated, the fire burned. I spoke with my tongue:
- Exod 15:6Your right hand, Yahweh, is glorious in power. Your right hand, Yahweh, dashes the enemy in pieces.
- Ps 29:3Yahweh’s voice is on the waters. The God of glory thunders, even Yahweh on many waters.
- Isa 45:9Woe to him who strives with his Maker — a clay pot among the clay pots of the earth! Shall the clay ask him who fashions it, ‘What are you making?’ or your work, ‘He has no hands?’
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 40:9 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.