Behemoth

Behemoth is the vast primordial ox or land-beast of Jewish myth, taken from the divine speeches in Job and expanded in the aggadah. It grazes upon a thousand mountains whose grass grows anew each day, and its strength is such that no creature can master it save its Maker. As Leviathan rules the sea, Behemoth rules the dry land; the two are paired as male and female cosmic monsters whose flesh will be served to the righteous at the end of days. Rabbinic tradition holds that God slew the female of the species so that the pair could not multiply and overrun the world.

Domains

• land beasts
• primordial chaos

Powers

• grazes the thousand mountains

Epithets

• שׁוֹר הַבָּר — the wild oxLouis Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, vol. 1 (1909), p. 28 (secondary)

Relations

• companion: LeviathanThe male beast of the dry land, set against the female Leviathan of the sea.1 Enoch 60:7-9 (primary)
• companion: ZizOne of the three primordial creatures of sea, land and sky.Louis Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, vol. 1 (Jewish Publication Society, 1909), pp. 27-30 (secondary)

Sources

• Behemoth is the primordial land-beast of Job, understood in rabbinic aggadah as a monstrous creature grazing a thousand mountains and destined, like Leviathan, for the messianic feast; God slew the female of the species to keep it from breeding.: Babylonian Talmud, Bava Batra 74b (primary); Job 40:15-24 (primary); Howard Schwartz, Tree of Souls (Oxford University Press, 2004), pp. 66-68 (secondary)