Job 39:11

11 Will you depend on the wild ox for its great strength and leave your heavy work for it to do?

Job 39:11 Meaning and Commentary

Job 39:11

Wilt thou trust him, because his strength [is] great?
&c.] No; tame oxen are employed because they are strong to labour, ( Psalms 144:14 ) ; and they are to be trusted, in ploughing or treading out the corn, under direction, because they are manageable, and will attend to business with constancy; but the wild ox, though stronger, and so fitter for labour, is yet not to be trusted, because unruly and unmanageable: if that sort of wild oxen called "uri" could be thought to be meant, for which Bootius F8 contends, Caesar's account of them would agree with this character of the "reem", as to his great strength: he says of them F9, they are in size a little smaller than elephants, of the kind, colour, and shape of a bull; they are of great strength and of great swiftness, and not to be tamed;

or wilt thou leave thy labour to him?
to plough thy fields, to harrow thy lands, and to bring home the ripe corn? as in ( Job 39:12 ) ; thou wilt not.


FOOTNOTES:

F8 Animadvers. Sacr. l. 3. c. 1. s. 14.
F9 Comment. de Bello Gall. l. 6. c. 27.

Job 39:11 In-Context

9 "Will the wild ox agree to serve you and stay by your feeding box at night?
10 Can you hold it to the plowed row with a harness so it will plow the valleys for you?
11 Will you depend on the wild ox for its great strength and leave your heavy work for it to do?
12 Can you trust the ox to bring in your grain and gather it to your threshing floor?
13 "The wings of the ostrich flap happily, but they are not like the feathers of the stork.
Scripture taken from the New Century Version. Copyright © 1987, 1988, 1991 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.