What Does Job 40:16 Mean?
Look now, his strength is in his loins, and his force is in the firm muscles of his belly.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Lo now, his strength is in his loins, and his force is in the navel of his belly.THE KEY
The verse gathers the creature’s force in its bodily core, from its loins to the strong muscles of its belly.
THE MEANING
The creature’s strength stands in its loins, and its vigor gathers through the muscles of its belly. The verse gives power a bodily shape and a place you can picture.
THE ROOT
שְׁרִירֵי בִטְנוֹ
shrirê vitnô
GROWS FROM
שרר
š-r-r
firmness, strength
“firm muscles” in this verse is shrirê vitnô. The Hebrew phrase describes the muscles of his belly, giving the verse’s center the texture of a firm, muscular core. The force named in the parallel line is held throughout the creature’s body, not only at a single point.
ALSO GROWS
sharir: firm, strong
שָׁרִיר
This related form brings firmness into the muscle image: the creature’s strength is pictured in what is firm within its frame.
shririm: muscles, sinews
שְׁרִירִים
The plural form names the muscles themselves, making the belly in this verse a muscular center of force.
אוֹנוֹ
ʾōnô
GROWS FROM
און
ʾ-w-n
vigor, strength, capacity
The word translated “force” carries the sense of vigor or strength. Here that vigor is placed in the loins and belly muscles, so power appears as embodied capacity.
ALSO GROWS
ʾōnî: my vigor, my strength
אֹנִי
Jacob uses this same root in “the beginning of my strength” (Genesis 49:3), linking the word with concentrated personal vigor.
ʾōnîm: vigor, strength
אוֹנִים
Psalm 78:51 uses this form in “the chief of their strength,” again describing strength as concentrated power.
THE PATTERN
Scripture gives strength a bodily address, locating power or readiness in the loins and limbs.
She girds her waist with strength, and makes her arms firm.He takes no delight in the strength of the horse; he takes no pleasure in the legs of a man.Stand therefore, with your loins girded about with truth, and put on the breastplate of alignment.THE THREAD
Reuben, you are my firstborn, my might, the first of my vigor, the surplus of lifting, and the surplus of strength.The word rendered “force” here, אוֹנוֹ, shares its root with “the beginning of my strength” in Jacob’s words. Job places that same vigor in the loins and belly muscles, making the link between bodily center and concentrated strength audible across the verses.
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