The first important similarity between these two texts is that the consonants for the Ugaritic dragon named Litanu, or LTN in Ugaritic, are contained within the consonants comprising the word Leviathan, LWYTN in Hebrew. (Note that most Middle Eastern alphabets are consonantal and omit symbols for vowels.) Notice also that, like Psalm 74, the Ugaritic dragon is a hydra. It has seven heads. However, the most important features that demonstrate their mutual identification are the cognate titles “fleeing serpent,” and “twisting serpent.” As the Ugaritologist Ola Wikander at Lund University writes, these terms are so rare that, “it is quite unthinkable that the combination of…these two specific words should have arisen by chance both in Ugaritic and Hebrew literature, and so a historical connection must be postulated” (Wikander, “Dragon-Slaying to Isaiah 27.1,” 117). The connection between Leviathan and Litanu, therefore, “is rather well-known in modern exegetical scholarship”. Williams points out the Leviathan parallel to new students of Ugaritic in the first lesson of his popular grammar. Michael Williams, Basics of Ancient Ugaritic: A Concise Grammar, Workbook, and Lexicon (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2012), 20. Rahmouni also states, “As is well known, the parallel pair btn brh // btn ‘qltn is the exact semantic equivalent of the Biblical Hebrew עקלתון נחש // ברח נחש) Isa. 27:1), which explicitly refers to לויתן’ Leviathan,’ the Hebrew equivalent of Ltn.” Divine Epithets, 143. Niehaus comments, “The verbal parallel alone between the Ugaritic and the Hebrew is astonishing…. It shows how stock phrasing can survive over many centuries—a common enough phenomenon in the ancient Near East, the more remarkable here because of an intercultural context.” Jeffrey Jay Niehaus, God at Sinai: Covenant and Theophany in the Bible and Ancient Near East (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1995), 113. It’s also indisputable (Averbeck, “Ancient Near Eastern,” 338).
What Does the Dragon Symbolize?
Job uses Leviathan in parallel with other dragons found in the Ugaritic texts—the Hebrew names Tannin and Yam. Moreover, these names are used interchangeably with the name Rahab and the title fleeing serpent. Notice the interchangeability of these titles in Job. Litanu is also used in conjunction with both Yam and Tannin (KTU 1.3:III:38-46, quoted in John Day, God’s Conflict with the Dragon and the Sea: Echoes of a Canaanite Myth in the Old Testament (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 13-14). Earlier in the same text, this “tyrant” is referred to as Litanu ( KTU 1.5:I:3. See comments in Rahmouni, Divine Epithets, 300). Therefore, Yam, Litanu, Rahab, Tannin, and Leviathan are all overlapping names (Averbeck, “Ancient Near Eastern Mythography,” 341). The title “dragon of the two flames” in the text above may even imply that the Ugaritic Litanu was fiery—an idea which would give us another conceptual parallel to the fire breathing in Job 41 (Rahmouni, Divine Epithets, 310). We also have ancient Near Eastern artifacts depicting seven-headed dragons both emanating flame and exhaling fire as they fight various gods ((In the Beginning: Essays on Creation Motifs in the Ancient Near East and the Bible. Siphrut 9 (Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 2013), 32).
In the Ugaritic texts, Litanu was the god of the chaotic waters of the sea that ever surround and threaten to overcome the terrestrial world (Christoph Uehlinger, “Leviathan” in K. van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter Willem van der Horst (eds.), Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (DDD) (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 511-515). Baal’s domination over the destructive forces of the sea, therefore, demonstrated his kingship over the created realm (Leviathan and Job in Job 41:2-3,” Journal of Biblical Literature 105.1 (1986), 108). This same kingship symbolism can be found by reexamining Psalm 74. This story is important because it remarkably parallels how the Babylonians themselves believed the world was created. Like Yhwh’s defeat of Leviathan and Baal’s battle with Litanu, Marduk had an epic brawl with a watery, primeval chaos dragon, in this version, named Tiamat. After defeating this foe, we read, “with his merciless club [Marduk] smashed her skull” (Enuma Elish, IV.130. Translation: L. W. King, Enuma Elish: The Seven Tablets of Creation, vol. 1 (London: Luzac and Co., 1902), 75). A common motif in Mesopotamian art for gods that wage battle against the chaos dragon and its monstrous minions shows the deity standing on top of these defeated enemies who come to represent aspects of the god’s power.
Leviathan in Job 41
- 1) In Psalm 74, God’s defeat of Leviathan precedes the creation of the world. If literal, this would contradict the creation account in Genesis 1.
- 2) Isaiah says Leviathan will be killed again at the eschaton. (What? Is there a surviving Liopleurodon out there in the Atlantic that God is going to give a knuckle sandwich at the eschaton?)
- 3) He has the cognate titles of an earlier Near Eastern chaos dragon (and however old you think Job is, it’s obvious that Job’s allusions to figures like Yam and Rahab reference earlier known Semitic dragon motifs).
- 4) In addition to breathing fire in Job 41(!), in Psalm 74, Leviathan has multiple heads (undoubtedly seven like his Ugaritic counterpart). There are no seven-headed reptiles in the fossil record.
Job 41 is referencing Leviathan as a personification of the watery chaos that ever threatens the created order.
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