Thomas Aquinas Commentary Job 41:1-8

"Canst thou draw out leviathan with a fishhook? Or press down his tongue with a cord? Canst thou put a rope into his nose? Or pierce his jaw through with a hook? Will he make many supplications unto thee? Or will he speak soft words unto thee? Will he make a covenant with thee, That thou shouldest take him for a servant for ever? Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? Or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens? Will the bands [of fishermen] make traffic of him? Will they part him among the merchants? Canst thou fill his skin with barbed irons, Or his head with fish-spears? Lay thy hand upon him; Remember the battle, and do so no more." — Job 41:1-8 (ASV)

After the Lord described the power of Leviathan, showing that humanity cannot conquer him but only God can, He now speaks of Leviathan's power to act against others. Since “there is no power unless it comes from God” (Romans 13:1), someone could ascribe cruelty to God for giving such great power to so harmful a creature. To exclude this possibility, He says, “I will not arouse him as if I were cruel,” meaning, “I will not permit him to be exalted by the power I gave him.”

This seems to answer what Job had said earlier, “You are changed for me into someone cruel” (Job 30:21). The Lord shows that this charge of cruelty should not be attributed to Him for three reasons.

First, because of God’s own power. He says, “For who can resist my gaze?”—that is, My providence. This is as if to say: Even though Leviathan is as powerful as he may be, he cannot resist My providence, so he only uses his power as I will. My will does not aim for the destruction of humanity but for its salvation.

Second, He shows the same thing from the bestowal of His goodness, by which He freely distributes His good things to everyone. So He says, “And who gave something first to me that I must repay him?” implying the answer, “No one.” From this it is clear that I love everything I have made and freely share My good things with them. Therefore, I do not have any cruel intention against anything I have made. This relates to the verse, “Everything under heaven belongs to me,” because they are created, preserved, and governed by Me, and no one wants to do evil to what is his own.

Third, He shows that He is not cruel in permitting Satan to be raised up in his power, because He yields to him in nothing. It is a characteristic of cruelty to favor a tyrant by patiently tolerating the afflictions of many people. People might favor the powerful for two reasons. One is out of fear of their threats, but the Lord excludes this from Himself, saying, “I will not spare him,” that is, I will not yield to him by failing to resist him as is necessary, “for his powerful words”—that is, because of the threatening words he uses as if to display his power.

Another way a person might favor someone powerful is by being allured with flattering words. To exclude this, He says, “words to turn me away by prayer,” as if to say: Even if he threatens powerfully or pleads submissively, I will still yield to him in nothing, because there is no compatibility “of light to darkness” (Compare to 2 Corinthians 6:14).

Having said these things to refute the charge of cruelty against Himself, He proceeds to describe the power of Leviathan, first describing his form, beginning with his head. It is said that “above the eyes of whales there are certain horns shaped like a great pruning hook. There are two hundred fifty over one eye and the same over the other, and the whale uses them to cover its eye during a great storm.” To express this, the text says, “Who will uncover the face of its clothing?” In other words, what person can get so near to the whale as to strip these coverings from its face? By this, we are meant to understand that no human is able to uncover the devil's cunning ways.

Another author says that “in its throat it has a skin-like membrane, perforated with many openings to prevent any large bodies from going down to its stomach,” because its digestion would be blocked if it swallowed a large animal whole. To show this, the text says, “and who will enter in the middle of his mouth?”—that is, to examine those narrow channels through which small fish descend to its stomach? He shows by this that no one can know the devil's intention, by which he is said to swallow people spiritually.

Another author says that the whale has a large mouth “provided with very large and long teeth, with two teeth especially longer than the others, like those of elephants or boars.” Thus, to show that these two largest teeth are on the outside, the text says, “Will you open the doors of his face?” For those two great teeth seem like two doors through which the whale's mouth is opened. In this image, He shows that no person can open the devil's mouth to extract sinners from his power—sinners whom he swallows as if through the two doors of violence and cunning.

As for the whale's other teeth, the text says, “Terrible is the circle of his teeth,” because it has teeth around its mouth so large that they can strike terror into those who see them. By this image, the text expresses the terror the devil inspires in people to drive them to sin. One can also interpret its teeth as the rest of the demons, or even as evil people who induce others to evil by frightening them with their power.

After the Lord has described these characteristics of Leviathan's head, He proceeds to the arrangement of its body, which He describes as being like a fish with scales. In keeping with the great size of its body, it has large scales like shields, so He says, “His body is like cast metal shields welded together.” These are without joints, unlike wooden shields which are tied together. The devil is compared to all evildoers as the head is to the body. Therefore, sinners who defend others in their evil are like the shields on the devil's body.

Consequently, He shows that its scales are not only large but also pressed closely together, like a fish with many scales. He shows this by saying they are “compact with the scales closely joining each other,” by which He shows the great number of evil people. He shows their perverse accord in evil when He says, “One is joined to another.” Just as on the body of a fish, each scale is not joined to another at random but has an order, so also in the crowd of evildoers, not everyone associates with everyone else, but rather certain people with certain other people.

As long as a fish is alive and strong, its scales are full of life, adhering so closely to each other and to the skin that not even air can come between them. But when the fish dies, is sick, or its scales dry out for some reason, this connection gradually loosens, so that the scales themselves curve and even something rather large can enter between them. To show, then, the vigor of Leviathan's scales, He says, “nor can breath pass between them,” that is, through the space between the scales.

By this, He means that the wicked are not separated from their complicity in malice by any spiritual persuasion or internal inspiration. Therefore, to show the obstinacy of their consensus in evil, He says, “One will adhere to another,” by mutual favor and consent. “They hold themselves together and cannot be separated in any way,” because of their obstinate consent in evil, just as the scales of Leviathan cannot be separated from each other by human power.