Job 39:18

18 But when she begins to run, she can laugh at any horse and rider.

Job 39:18 Meaning and Commentary

Job 39:18

What time she lifted up herself on high
It is sometimes eight foot high F12; when alarmed with approaching danger she raises up herself, being sitting on the ground, and erects her wings for flight, or rather running;

she scorneth the horse and his rider;
being then, as Pliny F13 says, higher than a man on horseback, and superior to a horse in swiftness; and though horsemen have been able to take wild asses and goats, very swift creatures, yet never ostriches, as Xenophon relates F14 of those in Arabia; and this creature has another method, when pursued, by which it defies and despises, as well as hurts and incommodes its pursuers, which is by casting stones backward at them with its feet as out of a sling F15.


FOOTNOTES:

F12 Philosoph. Transact. abridged, vol. 2. p. 360.
F13 Plin. Nat. Hist. l. 10. c. 1.
F14 De Expedit. Cyri, l. 1.
F15 Plin. ut supra. (Nat. Hist. l. 10. c. 1.) Aelian. de Animal. l. 4. c. 37.

Job 39:18 In-Context

16 She acts as if the eggs were not hers, and is unconcerned that her efforts were wasted.
17 It was I who made her foolish and did not give her wisdom.
18 But when she begins to run, she can laugh at any horse and rider.
19 Was it you, Job, who made horses so strong and gave them their flowing manes?
20 Did you make them leap like locusts and frighten people with their snorting?

Footnotes 1

  • [a]. [Probable text] run; [Hebrew unclear.]
Scripture taken from the Good News Translation - Second Edition, Copyright 1992 by American Bible Society. Used by Permission.