Job 41:5

Job 41:5 Wilt thou play with him as [with] a bird? or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens?

Ver. 5. Wilt thou play with him as with a bird?] Shall he make thee sport, as those poor birds that serve as pastime for little children? Or as the foolish Emperor Honorius delighted in his bird Roma (so he called it), at the loss whereof, when the city was taken by the Vandals, he grieved more than at all the rest? Indignum sane, regem aves praeferre viribus, saith the divine chronologer.

Wilt thou bind him for thy maidens?] Shall your daughters tie him with a thread, which, lengthening or strengthening at their discretion, shall make his prison either larger or straiter?

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Who dare look in his mouth?

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

a bird?--that is, tamed.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 5. Wilt thou play with him] Is he such a creature as thou canst tame; and of which thou canst make a pet, and give as a plaything to thy little girls? נערותיך naarotheycha; probably alluding to the custom of catching birds, tying a string to their legs, and giving them to children to play with; a custom execrable as ancient, and disgraceful as modern.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

5. Wilt thou make a pet thing of him? The commentators quote Catullus, passer, deliciœ meœ puellœ.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Wilt thou play with him as with a bird?.... In the hand or cage: leviathan plays in the sea, but there is no playing with him by land, Psa 104:26;

or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens? or young girls, as Mr. Broughton renders it; tie him in a string, as birds are for children to play with? Now, though crocodiles are very pernicious to children, and often make a prey of them when they approach too near the banks of the Nile, or whenever they have an opportunity of seizing them (k); yet there is an instance of the child of an Egyptian woman that was brought up with one, and used to play with it (l), though, when grown up, was killed by it; but no such instance can be given of the whale of any sort.

(k) Aelian. l. 10. c. 21. (l) Maxim. Tyr. Sermon. 38.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? - A bird that is tamed. The art of taming birds was doubtless early practiced, and they were kept for amusement. But the leviathan could not thus be tamed.

Or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens? - For their amusement. For such purposes doubtless, birds were caught and caged. There is great force in this question, on the supposition that the crocodile is intended. Nothing could be more incongruous than the idea of securing so rough and unsightly a monster for the amusement of tender and delicate females.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

As with a bird; as children play with little birds kept in cages, or tied with strings, which they do at their pleasure, and without any fear?

For thy maidens; for thy little daughters; which he mentions rather than little sons, because such are most subject to fear.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

5. As with a bird — Catullus (ii, 1) speaks of “the sparrow, the delight of my girl.” Generically, the crocodile was probably the most untamable of animals, and yet even they have now and then been tamed to do the will of man. A Roman statue now in the British Museum represents an Egyptian tumbler performing on the back of a crocodile, as exhibited in the theatre at Rome. See note on Job_3:8; and Sharpe’s Bible Texts, page 96.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Wilt thou play with him as with a bird? The Egyptians were especially fond of pet animals, and Job"s countrymen, it may be assumed, were the same. Besides dogs, we find the Egyptians keeping tame antelopes, leopards, and monkeys. A tame crocodile would certainly seem to be an extraordinary pet, but Herodotus says that the Egyptians tamed them (2:39), and Sir Gardner Wilkinson informed me that he had known some tame ones at Cairo. The Mesopotamian Arabs domesticate falcons to assist them in the chase of the bustard and the gazelle (Layard, "Nineveh and Babylon," pp. 481-483). And this usage, though not represented on the Assyrian monuments, is likely to have been ancient. Or wilt thou bind him for thy maidens? i.e. Wilt thou so secure him that he may be delivered over to thy handmaidens, to be made their pet and playfellow?

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Who exposed the face of his raiment He returns to the previous topic to speak of the leviathan: who can expose the scales, which are... within his double bridle Into the fold of his lips, when they are open, who is it who will enter there? [The expression] בְּכֶפֶל, double, denotes the lips, which are double, one above and one below, into which no creature may enter because of fear of him.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.