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| '''Behemoth''' is a powerful animal that appears to be herbivorous; in fact this can be used to describe any large or powerful creature as well.
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| '''Behemoth''' can be interpreted as a mythical animal. However, some have attempted to identify it with real-life animals.
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| ==Name==
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| '''Behemoth''' is the name of a creature mentioned in the '''Book of Job''', 40:15-24.
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| In Hebrew can be translated as '''áäîåú''', '''Bəhēmôth''', '''Behemot''', '''B'hemot'''; in Arabic ÈåíãæË ('''Bahīmūth''') or ÈåãæÊ ('''Bahamut''' or '''Bahamūt''') .
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| ===Etymology===
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| The word is most likely a plural form of áäîä (''bəhēmāh'' (''animal'')). It may be an example of ''pluralis excellentiae'', a Hebrew method of expressing greatness by pluralizing a noun; it thus indicates that Behemoth is the largest and most powerful animal.
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| ===Description===
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| In Jewish belief, it’s the primal unconquerable monster of the land, as the [[Leviathan]] is the primal monster of the waters of the sea.
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| There is a legend that the [[Leviathan]] and the '''Behemoth''' shall hold the battle of the end of the world. They shall kill each other and a huge number of other creatures in the big battle. The two will finally kill each other, and the surviving men will feast on their meat. According to midrash recording traditions, it is impossible for anyone to kill a behemoth except for the person who created it, in this case. A later Jewish haggadic tradition furthermore holds that at the banquet at the end of the world, the behemoth will be served up along with the [[Leviathan]] and [[ziz]].
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| ==Main Belief==
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| In the book of Job, both Behemoth and Leviathan are listed alongside a number of mundane animals, such as goats, eagles, and hawks, leading many Christian scholars to surmise that '''Behemoth''' and [[Leviathan]] may also be mundane creatures.
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| Suggested animals include the water buffalo and the elephant, but the most common suggestion is the hippopotamus. Some readers also identify a hippopotamus in ''Book of Isaiah'''s ''bahamot negeb'' or "beasts of the south" (30:6).
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| Although the animal's tail ''moves like a cedar'' (40:17), an unlikely description for any of these animals, ''tail'' could be a euphemism for an elephant's trunk. (Mitchell, 1987). Others disagree, pointing to the fact that Behemoth is called ''chief of the ways of God'' (40:19), indicating that it is not a mere animal.
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| A rather less popular proposal is that the Behemoth is a [[dinosaur]]. The '''Apatosaurus''' is usually proposed since the large sauropods had tails "like a cedar".
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| One weakness of this view is that the Bible does not say that Behemoth's tail is ''as large as'' a cedar, only that its tail ''moves like'' a cedar.
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| However some Christians would argue that this was [[God]] speaking to Job, and God was not necessarily going into detail and the original Hebrew Bible should be studied.
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| Furthermore [[God]] clearly indicated that this was a very large and powerful animal in the surrounding passages.
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| Behemoth rules over the domain of gluttony, and is said to be butler and high cupbearer of [[Hell]].
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| Bodin thought he was the Egyptian Pharaoh who persecuted the Israelites.
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| Others believe he is a species that no longer exists. Urbain Brandier wrote that he was definitely a [[demon]], whereas Delancre sees him as a monstrous animal, who can disguise himself as a dog, elephant, fox, or wolf. ''The Book of Job'' describes him as a monstrous creature.
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| Behemoth is not listed in Wierus' ''hierarchy of demons'', though Wierus does admit that Behemoth could be [[Satan]] himself.
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| It is also said(''The Book of Job'', chapter 40) that rabbis make him a great roast on the festival of their Messiah because he can eat as much hay as beef.
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| They make the roast large enough so that Behemoth must gobble up the hay of a thousand mountains a day, which he has eaten since the beginning of the world.
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| He never leaves these mountains, for if he did, time would be disrupted.
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| The rabbis also claim that God killed the female of the species so that they could never reproduce.
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| ===In the Old Testament===
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| '''Behemoth''', a spirit of the desert, possibly derives from the Egyptian for "water buffalo" or from the Egyptian deity, Taueret, about whom the Greek historian, Herodotus, wrote. The term ''Behemoth'' in the Hebrew is the plural form of the very common ''behemah'' referring to a beast of use to humans or a dumb animal. It is being used here, however, as a single entity.
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| '''Ethiopic Apocalypse of Enoch''', second century BCE - first century CE) gives the following description of this demon's origins: 'And that day will two monsters be parted, one monster, a female named [[Leviathan]] in order to dwell in the abyss of the ocean over the fountains of water; and the other, a male called Behemoth, which holds his chest in an invisible desert whose name is Dundayin, east of the garden of Eden.' - 1 Enoch 60:7-8
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| ===Other cultures===
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| The Hebrew '''behemoth''' is sometimes equated with the Persian '''Hadhayosh''', as the [[Leviathan]] is with the '''Kar''' and the '''ziz''' with the ''Simurgh''.
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| ==References==
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| *Bamberger, Bernard, 1952. ''Fallen Angels - The Soldiers of Satan's Realm''. ISBN: 156619850X [http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/156619850X/ref=sr_11_1/002-3264284-7701655?ie=UTF8]
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| *Langton, Edward, 1977. ''Satan, a Portrait''. ISBN: 0848215621 [http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0848215621/qid=1151954649/sr=11-1/ref=sr_11_1/002-3264284-7701655?n=283155]
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| *Mitchell, Steven, 1987. ''The Book of Job''. San Francisco: North Point Press. [http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060969598/sr=8-1/qid=1151944932/ref=pd_bbs_1/102-2305931-9420165?ie=UTF8]
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| ==Fiction==
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| *Milton,John, ''[[Paradise Lost]]''. In the book the author describes the birth of Behemoth [http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0140424393/qid=1151945015/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/102-2305931-9420165?s=books&v=glance&n=283155]
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| ==Links==
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| {{wikipedia}}
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| *[http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/ ''Jewish Encyclopedia'']: Behemoth.
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| *[http://www.bookofjob.org Putting God on Trial- The Biblical Book of Job] contains a major section on the literary use of Behemoth.
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| *[http://www.deliriumsrealm.com/delirium/articleview.asp?Post=110 Behemoth in the Old Testament and literature]
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| [[Category:Fabulous beasts]]
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| [[Category:Biblical mythology]]
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