Weekly Pastoral Message prepared by Rev. Murray Adamthwaite
for Sunday 20th September 1998

From the Pastor: Animal Lessons IX

"Behold behemoth ... his strength is in his hips ... He bends his tail like a cedar tree." Job 40:16-17 Dinosaurs, we know, belong to the very distant past. They roamed the earth, then died out millions of years ago. They therefore could not have been contemporary with man in any way whatever. Only a screwball would insist that they were. So runs the familiar propaganda line. You will find it in a thousand school texts, a million captions to dinosaur pictures, and a near infinite number of statements from lectures to personal conversations. Yet, did you know that dinosaurs are described in the Bible? Of course, they are not called that. Our word "dinosaur" comes from two Greek works meaning together "terrible lizard", but the awe-inspiring "behemoth" described in Job 40:15-24, when translated correctly and stripped of modern commentary, corresponds very closely to what we know of a brontosaurus. Look at the description: vegetarian, lives in the wetlands, withstands surging floods, has strong hips and thighs, and most significantly, a tail like a cedar tree. The common designation of a hippopotamus will not fit: that creature has a little curled piggy tail, and it defies accuracy to describe its stumpy legs as "like iron bars". This imposing creature, immune from human attempts to capture or even control it (Job 40:24), is introduced in order to humble Job by the majesty and power of God's creation. This display, among others, had the desired effect, but a 100 foot long and 40 foot high brontosaurus would inflict terror into anyone. Hence the old "bronto" must be included in our catalogue of bible animals, even if it is now extinct. What few remained in the post-flood world probably ate themselves out of house and home. Yet the message is still the same as it was to the patriarch. every time you go to a natural history museum, or look at a book with a dinosaur skeleton photo, say with Job, "Behold, I am insignificant; what can I reply to Thee?" (Job 40:4).