Verse-by-Verse Bible Commentary

Adam Clarke Commentary

His bones are as strong pieces of brass-bars of iron - The tusk I have mentioned above is uncommonly hard, solid, and weighty for its size.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Whole Bible

His bones are as strong pieces of brass - The circumstance here adverted to was remarkable, because the common residence of the animal was the water, and the bones of aquatic animals are generally hollow, and much less firm than those of land animals. It should be observed here, that the word rendered “brass” in the Scriptures most probably denotes “copper.” Brass is a compound metal, composed of copper and zinc; and there is no reason to suppose that the art of compounding it was known at as early a period of the world as the time of Job. The word here translated “strong pieces” (אפיק 'âphı̂yq ) is rendered by Schultens “alvei - channels,” or “beds,” as of a rivulet or stream; and by Rosenmuller, Gesenius, Noyes, and Umbreit, “tubes” - supposed to allude to the fact that they seemed to be hollow tubes of brass. But the more common meaning of the word is “strong, mighty,” and there is no impropriety in retaining that sense here; and then the meaning would be, that his bones were so firm that they seemed to be made of solid metal.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

His bones are as strong pieces of brass: his bones are as bars of iron. Than which nothing is stronger. The repetition is made for greater illustration and confirmation; but what is said is not applicable to the elephant, whose bones are porous and rimous, light and spongy for the most part, as appears from the osteology^F11In Philosoph. Transact. vol. 5. p. 155, 156. of it; excepting its teeth, which are the ivory; though the teeth of the river horse are said to exceed them in hardness^F12Odoardus Barbosa apud Bochart. ut supra. (Apud Hierozoic. par. 2. l. 5. c. 14. col. 758.) ; and artificers say^F13Diepenses apud ib. they are wrought with greater difficulty than ivory. The ancients, according to Pausanias^F14Arcadica, sive, l. 8. p. 530. , used them instead of it; who relates, that the face of the image of the goddess Cybele was made of them: and Kircher^F15China cum Monument. p. 193. says, in India they make beads, crucifixes, and statues of saints of them; and that they are as hard or harder than a flint, and fire may be struck out of them. So the teeth of the morss, a creature of the like kind in the northern countries, are valued by the inhabitants as ivory^F16Olaus Magnus, ut supra, (De Ritu. Septent. Gent.) l. 2. c. 19. Voyage to Spitzbergen, p. 115. , for hardness, whiteness, and weight, beyond it, and are dearer and much traded in; See Gill on Job 40:20; but no doubt not the teeth only, but the other bones of the creature in the text are meant.

Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

strong — rather, “tubes” of copper [Umbreit].

John Trapp Complete Commentary

Job 40:18 His bones [are as] strong pieces of brass; his bones [are] like bars of iron.

Ver. 18. His bones are as strony pieces of brass] Or, as conduit pipes of brass, whereby may be understood his hollow bones, as by bars of iron the solid ones, and by both (together with his trunk, composed of gristles, and his teeth and tusks, eight feet long, some of them) we may conjecture to be the size of his whole body; the size of all earthly creatures, saith Pliny; nine cubits high, saith Aelian, of some. Now can Job look upon such a monstrous creature, or hear his noise, or stand before him, without great horror? and will he not submit to the great God, and give him all his glory.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible

His bones; under which title are comprehended his ribs (as the LXX here render it) and his teeth.

As strong pieces of brass, exceeding hard and strong, as they are in both these creature.

Whedon's Commentary on the Bible

18.His bones’ strong pieces of brass, etc. — Although he eat grass, his bones are as tubes of brass — are like hammered bars of iron. The second word rendered bones , may mean “ribs,” in contrast with the hollow bones before spoken of.

George Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary

Wonder. Hebrew, "make haste," taking time to render it muddy. (Ælian xiv. 44.) --- It can drink a great deal at once, and then abstain for a week. (Calmet) --- Run. Hebrew, "he may draw." Septuagint, "may knock at his mouth," (Haydock) in vain, (Calmet) as long as it can breathe by holding by holding its trunk out of the water. (Aristotle ix. 46.) --- Theo.[Theodotion?] in the Septuagint, "If there should be an inundation, it shall not perceive. It confideth that, or when, the Jordan shall knock at its mouth. He shall take it by its eye; saying snares, he shall bore [its] nose." (Haydock)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(18) Strong pieces.—Or, perhaps, tubes. His limbs are like bars of iron.

Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

7:12; Isaiah 48:4