Of all the creatures, it is the proudest. It is the king of beasts.”
Parallel translations
- WEB He sees everything that is high. He is king over all the sons of pride.”
- KJV He beholdeth all high things: he is a king over all the children of pride.
- BSB He looks down on all the haughty; he is king over all the proud.”
- NKJV He beholds every high thing; He is king over all the children of pride.”
- NASB “He looks on everything that is high; He is king over all the sons of pride.”
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
Leviathan looks down on everything proud and reigns as king over all the proud. He embodies a defiant power that only God Himself can ultimately master.
Overview
This climactic verse pictures Leviathan as sovereign over all the proud, fearing nothing high or lofty. The closing image drives home God's argument from the whirlwind: human pride is small before such a creature, and smaller still before the Creator who made and rules it. Faithful readers have long seen Leviathan as a fitting emblem of proud, hostile powers that God alone subdues, pointing forward to Christ's final triumph over every evil power.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 10
- Ezek 29:3Speak and say, ‘Thus says the Lord Yahweh: “Behold, I am against you, Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great monster that lies in the middle of his rivers, that has said, ‘My river is my own, and I have made it for myself.’
- Ps 73:6Therefore pride is like a chain around their neck. Violence covers them like a garment.
- Job 28:8The proud animals have not trodden it, nor has the fierce lion passed by there.
- Job 26:12He stirs up the sea with his power, and by his understanding he strikes through Rahab.
- Ps 73:10Therefore their people return to them, and they drink up waters of abundance.
- Rev 12:1–3A great sign was seen in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.
- Rev 13:2The beast which I saw was like a leopard, and his feet were like those of a bear, and his mouth like the mouth of a lion. The dragon gave him his power, his throne, and great authority.
- Isa 28:1Woe to the crown of pride of the drunkards of Ephraim, and to the fading flower of his glorious beauty, which is on the head of the fertile valley of those who are overcome with wine!
- Rev 20:2–3He seized the dragon, the old serpent, which is the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole inhabited earth, and bound him for a thousand years,
- Exod 5:2Pharaoh said, “Who is Yahweh, that I should listen to his voice to let Israel go? I don’t know Yahweh, and moreover I will not let Israel go.”
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.
Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.
Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
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 41:34 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.