Job 39:21

21. He paweth The subject of this verb, which is in the plural, is uncertain, and is supposed by Cocceius, Ewald, and Zockler to be “the riders,” who “explore” in the valley; for this is the meaning they attach to the verb. Hitzig thinks that the word חפר , “to paw,” originally read חבר , “gather together,” and that the middle letter ב has been corrupted into a פ , and renders the phrase, “they form in troops in the plain, and it [the horse] rejoiceth in its strength.” The prime meaning of the verb hhaphar is “to dig,” as in Job 3:21; Job 11:18, (on the latter of which see note,) and to represent the well-known action of a high-spirited charger, impatient of delay, is a much stronger word than our word “paweth.” The classics embody the figure before us in more laboured descriptions, and more polished periods; but they all fail of the sublime heights to which the sacred writer, teaching of commonest subjects, rises without effort. Thus writes Apollonius, born 253, B.C.:

As a war-horse, impatient for the battle,

Neighing, beats the ground with his hoofs.

Σκαρθμω … κρουει πεδον . Also Virgil, (Georgic 3:88,):

Cavat que Tellurem, et solido graviter sonat ungula cornu,

And earth around Rings to his solid hoof, that wears the ground.

AElian says of the war-horse, “When he hears the sounding of the reins and the clattering of the bits, and sees the breast-plates and the forehead-pieces, he neighs, and, leaping, makes the ground to ring with his hoofs.”

Valley Mentioned because cavalry are unsuited for fighting among the hills.

Armed men Oppian in like manner remarks of the war-horse, that he has the courage to meet the armed men, οπλοις . In modern times, however, a solid phalanx of infantry is quite equal to any onset of cavalry, illustrations of which are afforded by the battles of the Pyramids and Waterloo. The Israelites, it is to be remembered, conquered Palestine on foot. They were a nation of infantry. In this respect they resembled the early Egyptians, who do not appear to have possessed any cavalry before the eighteenth dynasty; (see Rawlinson’s Herodotus, ii, pp. 152, 299,) and thus differed from other surrounding nations, such as the Ishmaelite, whose horse has always been his pride and his defence; and from the Canaanite, who was famous for his horses and his chariots. The horsemen formed a no less important part of the Assyrian army than the charioteers. “Horsemen are seen in the most ancient sculptures in Nimroud, and disciplined bodies of cavalry were represented in the bass-reliefs of Kouyunjik.” Layard. In the times of Solomon the horse appears as a right arm of Israelitish defence. 1 Kings 10:28; 2 Chronicles 1:16-17; 2 Chronicles 9:28. Mohammed had evidently read this description before writing the One Hundredth Sura of the Koran, which is entitled, “The war-horses which run swiftly.” It commences: “By the war-horses which run swiftly to the battle, with a panting noise; and by those which strike fire by dashing their hoofs against the stones; and by those which make a sudden incursion on the enemy early in the morning, which make the dust fly under their rapid feet; which pass through the hostile troops; verily, man is ungrateful unto the Lord; and he is witness thereof.”