Smoke streams from its nostrils like steam from a pot heated over burning rushes.
Parallel translations
- WEB Out of his nostrils a smoke goes, as of a boiling pot over a fire of reeds.
- KJV Out of his nostrils goeth smoke, as out of a seething pot or caldron.
- BSB Smoke billows from his nostrils as from a boiling pot over burning reeds.
- NKJV Smoke goes out of his nostrils, As from a boiling pot and burning rushes.
- NASB “From his nostrils smoke goes out As from a boiling pot and burning reeds.
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
Smoke pours from Leviathan's nostrils like steam from a boiling pot. The imagery underscores the creature's fearsome breath.
Overview
Leviathan's nostrils emit smoke as from a boiling cauldron over a reed fire. The poetic picture conveys a creature of overwhelming, almost supernatural ferocity. Such imagery serves to exalt the Creator who alone made and masters this beast. The cumulative portrait presses Job to abandon all pretension and to bow before the God of incomparable power.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 1
- Jer 1:13–14Yahweh’s word came to me the second time, saying, “What do you see?” I said, “I see a boiling cauldron; and it is tipping away from the north.”
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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 41:20 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.