Will he make a covenant with you to take him as a slave for life?
Parallel translations
- WEB Will he make a covenant with you, that you should take him for a servant forever?
- KJV Will he make a covenant with thee? wilt thou take him for a servant for ever?
- NKJV Will he make a covenant with you? Will you take him as a servant forever?
- NASB “Will he make a covenant with you? Will you take him as a servant forever?
- NLT Will it agree to work for you, to be your slave for life?
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 if Leviathan will make a covenant to serve Job forever. The untamable creature will never become man's perpetual servant.
Overview
The question of whether Leviathan would enter a covenant of lifelong servitude continues the irony. No such creature submits to human mastery. The imagery exposes the limits of Job's power and dominion. If Job cannot enlist Leviathan as a servant, he must abandon any thought of contending with the God who holds the creature in his hand.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 5
- Exod 21:6then his master is to bring him before the judges. And he shall take him to the door or doorpost and pierce his ear with an awl. Then he shall serve his master for life.
- Deut 15:17then take an awl and pierce it through his ear into the door, and he will become your servant for life. And treat your maidservant the same way.
- 1 Kgs 20:31–34Then the servants of Ben-hadad said to him, “Look now, we have heard that the kings of the house of Israel are merciful. Let us go out to the king of Israel with sackcloth around our waists and ropes around our heads. Perhaps he will spare your life.”
- Ps 8:5–6You made him a little lower than the angels; You crowned him with glory and honor.
- Gen 1:28God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that crawls upon the earth.”
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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 41:4 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.