Reference: Dragon
American
Answers, in the English Bible, the Hebrew word signifying a sea-monster, huge serpent, etc. Thus in De 32:33; Jer 51:34; Re 12, it evidently implies a huge serpent; in Isa 27:1; 51:9; Eze 29:3, it may mean the crocodile, or any large sea-monster; while in Job 30:29; La 4:3; Mic 1:8, it seems to refer to some wild animal of the desert, most probably the jackal. The animal known to modern naturalists under the name of dragon, is a harmless species of lizard, found in Asia and Africa.
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In that day lay a charge doth Jehovah, With his sword -- the sharp, and the great, and the strong, On leviathan -- a fleeing serpent, And on leviathan -- a crooked serpent, And He hath slain the dragon that is in the sea.
Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of Jehovah, Awake, as in days of old, generations of the ages, Art not Thou it that is hewing down Rahab, Piercing a dragon!
Devoured us, crushed us, hath Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, He hath set us as an empty vessel, He hath swallowed us as a dragon, He hath filled his belly with my dainties, He hath driven us away.
Even dragons have drawn out the breast, They have suckled their young ones, The daughter of my people is become cruel, Like the ostriches in a wilderness.
Speak, and thou hast said: Thus said the Lord Jehovah: Lo, I am against thee, Pharaoh king of Egypt! The great dragon that is crouching in the midst of his floods, Who hath said, My flood is my own, And I -- I have made it for myself.
For this I lament and howl, I go spoiled and naked, I make a lamentation like dragons, And a mourning like daughters of an ostrich.
Easton
(1.) Heb tannim, plural of tan. The name of some unknown creature inhabiting desert places and ruins (Job 30:29; Ps 44:19; Isa 13:22; 34:13; 43:20; Jer 10:22; Mic 1:8; Mal 1:3); probably, as translated in the Revised Version, the jackal (q.v.).
(2.) Heb tannin. Some great sea monster (Jer 51:34 it may denote the crocodile. In Ge 1:21 (Heb plural tanninim) the Authorized Version renders "whales," and the Revised Version "sea monsters." It is rendered "serpent" in Ex 7:9. It is used figuratively in Ps 74:13; Eze 29:3.
In the New Testament the word "dragon" is found only in Re 12:3-4,7,9,16-17, etc., and is there used metaphorically of "Satan." (See Whale.)
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And God prepareth the great monsters, and every living creature that is creeping, which the waters have teemed with, after their kind, and every fowl with wing, after its kind, and God seeth that it is good.
When Pharaoh speaketh unto you, saying, Give for yourselves a wonder; then thou hast said unto Aaron, Take thy rod, and cast before Pharaoh -- it becometh a monster.'
But Thou hast smitten us in a place of dragons, And dost cover us over with death-shade.
Thou hast broken by Thy strength a sea -monster, Thou hast shivered Heads of dragons by the waters,
And Aiim have responded in his forsaken habitations, And dragons in palaces of delight, And near to come is her time, And her days are not drawn out!
And gone up her palaces have thorns, Nettle and bramble are in her fortresses, And it hath been a habitation of dragons, A court for daughters of an ostrich.
Honour me doth the beast of the field, Dragons and daughters of an ostrich, For I have given in a wilderness waters, Floods in a desolate place, To give drink to My people -- My chosen.
A voice of a report, lo, it hath come, Even a great shaking from the north country, To make the cities of Judah a desolation, A habitation of dragons.
Devoured us, crushed us, hath Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, He hath set us as an empty vessel, He hath swallowed us as a dragon, He hath filled his belly with my dainties, He hath driven us away.
Speak, and thou hast said: Thus said the Lord Jehovah: Lo, I am against thee, Pharaoh king of Egypt! The great dragon that is crouching in the midst of his floods, Who hath said, My flood is my own, And I -- I have made it for myself.
For this I lament and howl, I go spoiled and naked, I make a lamentation like dragons, And a mourning like daughters of an ostrich.
Is not Esau Jacob's brother? -- an affirmation of Jehovah, And I love Jacob, and Esau I have hated, And I make his mountains a desolation, And his inheritance for dragons of a wilderness.
And there was seen another sign in the heaven, and, lo, a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his head seven diadems, and his tail doth draw the third of the stars of the heaven, and he did cast them to the earth; and the dragon did stand before the woman who is about to bring forth, that when she may bring forth, her child he may devour;
And there came war in the heaven; Michael and his messengers did war against the dragon, and the dragon did war, and his messengers,
and the great dragon was cast forth -- the old serpent, who is called 'Devil,' and 'the Adversary,' who is leading astray the whole world -- he was cast forth to the earth, and his messengers were cast forth with him.
and the land did help the woman, and the land did open its mouth and did swallow up the river, that the dragon did cast forth out of his mouth; and the dragon was angry against the woman, and went away to make war with the rest of her seed, those keeping the commands of God, and having the testimony of Jesus Christ.
Fausets
Tannin, tan. Tan in Jer 14:6, "dragons" "snuffing up the wind" is translated by Henderson jackals; rather the great boas and python serpents are meant, which raise their body vertically ten or twelve feet high, surveying the neighborhood above the bushes, while with open jaws they drink in the air. They were made types of the deluge and all destructive agencies; hence the dragon temples are placed near water in Asia, Africa, and Britain, e.g. that of Abury in Wiltshire. The ark is often associated with it, as the preserver from the waters. The dragon temples are serpentine in form; dragon standards were used in Egypt and Babylon, and among the widely-scattered Celts.
Apollo's slaying Python is the Greek legend implying the triumph of light over darkness and evil. The tannin are any great monsters, whether of land or sea, trans. Ge 1:21 "great sea monsters." So (La 4:3) "even sea monsters (tannin) draw out the breast," alluding to the mammalia which sometimes visit the Mediterranean, or the halichore cow whale of the Red Sea. Large whales do not often frequent the Mediterranean, which was the sea that the Israelites knew; they apply "sea" to the Nile and Euphrates, and so apply "tannin" to the crocodile, their horror in Egypt, as also to the large serpents which they saw in the desert. "The dragon in the sea," which Jehovah shall punish in the day of Israel's deliverance, is Antichrist, the antitype to Babylon on the Euphrates' waters (Isa 27:1).
In Ps 74:13, "Thou brokest the heads of the dragons in the waters," Egypt's princes and Pharaoh are poetically represented hereby, just as crocodiles are the monarchs of the Nile waters. So (Isa 51:9-10) the crocodile is the emblem of Egypt and its king on coins of Augustus struck after the conquest of Egypt. "A habitation of dragons" expresses utter desolation, as venomous snakes abound in ruins of ancient cities (De 32:33; Jer 49:33; Isa 34:13). In the New Testament it symbolizes Satan the old serpent (Genesis 3), combining gigantic strength with craft, malignity, and venom (Re 12:3). The dragon's color, "red," fiery red, implies that he was a murderer from the beginning.
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And God prepareth the great monsters, and every living creature that is creeping, which the waters have teemed with, after their kind, and every fowl with wing, after its kind, and God seeth that it is good.
Thou hast broken by Thy strength a sea -monster, Thou hast shivered Heads of dragons by the waters,
In that day lay a charge doth Jehovah, With his sword -- the sharp, and the great, and the strong, On leviathan -- a fleeing serpent, And on leviathan -- a crooked serpent, And He hath slain the dragon that is in the sea.
And gone up her palaces have thorns, Nettle and bramble are in her fortresses, And it hath been a habitation of dragons, A court for daughters of an ostrich.
Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of Jehovah, Awake, as in days of old, generations of the ages, Art not Thou it that is hewing down Rahab, Piercing a dragon! Art not Thou it that is drying up a sea, Waters of a great deep? That hath made deep places of a sea A way for the passing of the redeemed?
And wild asses have stood on high places, They have swallowed up wind like dragons, Consumed have been their eyes, for there is no herb.
And Hazor hath been for a habitation of dragons, A desolation -- unto the age, No one doth dwell there, nor sojourn in it doth a son of man!'
Even dragons have drawn out the breast, They have suckled their young ones, The daughter of my people is become cruel, Like the ostriches in a wilderness.
And there was seen another sign in the heaven, and, lo, a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his head seven diadems,
Hastings
(1) tann
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And God prepareth the great monsters, and every living creature that is creeping, which the waters have teemed with, after their kind, and every fowl with wing, after its kind, and God seeth that it is good.
When Pharaoh speaketh unto you, saying, Give for yourselves a wonder; then thou hast said unto Aaron, Take thy rod, and cast before Pharaoh -- it becometh a monster.' And Moses goeth in -- Aaron also -- unto Pharaoh, and they do so as Jehovah hath commanded; and Aaron casteth his rod before Pharaoh, and before his servants, and it becometh a monster. read more. And Pharaoh also calleth for wise men, and for sorcerers; and the scribes of Egypt, they also, with their flashings, do so, and they cast down each his rod, and they become monsters, and the rod of Aaron swalloweth their rods;
A sea -monster am I, or a dragon, That thou settest over me a guard?
But Thou hast smitten us in a place of dragons, And dost cover us over with death-shade.
Thou hast broken by Thy strength a sea -monster, Thou hast shivered Heads of dragons by the waters,
And Aiim have responded in his forsaken habitations, And dragons in palaces of delight, And near to come is her time, And her days are not drawn out!
And gone up her palaces have thorns, Nettle and bramble are in her fortresses, And it hath been a habitation of dragons, A court for daughters of an ostrich.
And the mirage hath become a pond, And the thirsty land fountains of waters, In the habitation of dragons, Its place of couching down, a court for reed and rush.
Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of Jehovah, Awake, as in days of old, generations of the ages, Art not Thou it that is hewing down Rahab, Piercing a dragon!
A voice of a report, lo, it hath come, Even a great shaking from the north country, To make the cities of Judah a desolation, A habitation of dragons.
And Hazor hath been for a habitation of dragons, A desolation -- unto the age, No one doth dwell there, nor sojourn in it doth a son of man!'
Devoured us, crushed us, hath Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, He hath set us as an empty vessel, He hath swallowed us as a dragon, He hath filled his belly with my dainties, He hath driven us away.
Speak, and thou hast said: Thus said the Lord Jehovah: Lo, I am against thee, Pharaoh king of Egypt! The great dragon that is crouching in the midst of his floods, Who hath said, My flood is my own, And I -- I have made it for myself.
Son of man, lift up a lamentation for Pharaoh king of Egypt, and thou hast said unto him: A young lion of nations thou hast been like, And thou art as a dragon in the seas, And thou comest forth with thy flowings, And dost trouble the waters with thy feet, And thou dost foul their flowings.
Is not Esau Jacob's brother? -- an affirmation of Jehovah, And I love Jacob, and Esau I have hated, And I make his mountains a desolation, And his inheritance for dragons of a wilderness.
And there was seen another sign in the heaven, and, lo, a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his head seven diadems,
Morish
tannin, ??????. It may signify any great serpent or sea monster, symbolical of a huge destructive creature. Nations doomed to destruction and desolation, including Jerusalem, are said to become habitations of dragons. Isa 34:13; 35:7; Jer 9:11; 10:22; 51:37. Pharaoh, king of Egypt, is called the great dragon. Eze 29:3. As one of God's creatures the dragon is called upon to praise Jehovah. Ps 148:7. In the N.T. the dragon is a type of Satan and those energised by him. In Re 12:3 the "great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns," is symbolical of Satan's power in the form of the Roman empire: it endeavoured, in the person of Herod, to destroy Christ when born. In Re 13:2,4 it is Satan who gives the resuscitated Roman empire in a future day its throne and great authority. In Re 13:11 the Antichrist, who has two horns like a lamb, speaks as a dragon. In Re 16:13 it is Satan, and in Re 20:2 he is described as "that old serpent, which is the Devil and Satan."
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Praise ye Jehovah from the earth, Dragons and all deeps,
And gone up her palaces have thorns, Nettle and bramble are in her fortresses, And it hath been a habitation of dragons, A court for daughters of an ostrich.
And the mirage hath become a pond, And the thirsty land fountains of waters, In the habitation of dragons, Its place of couching down, a court for reed and rush.
And I make Jerusalem become heaps, A habitation of dragons, And the cities of Judah I make a desolation, Without inhabitant.
A voice of a report, lo, it hath come, Even a great shaking from the north country, To make the cities of Judah a desolation, A habitation of dragons.
And Babylon hath been for heaps, A habitation of dragons, An astonishment, and a hissing, without inhabitant.
Speak, and thou hast said: Thus said the Lord Jehovah: Lo, I am against thee, Pharaoh king of Egypt! The great dragon that is crouching in the midst of his floods, Who hath said, My flood is my own, And I -- I have made it for myself.
And there was seen another sign in the heaven, and, lo, a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his head seven diadems,
and the beast that I saw was like to a leopard, and its feet as of a bear, and its mouth as the mouth of a lion, and the dragon did give to it his power, and his throne, and great authority.
and they did bow before the dragon who did give authority to the beast, and they did bow before the beast, saying, 'Who is like to the beast? who is able to war with it?'
And I saw another beast coming up out of the land, and it had two horns, like a lamb, and it was speaking as a dragon,
and I saw come out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs --
and he laid hold on the dragon, the old serpent, who is Devil and Adversary, and did bind him a thousand years,
Smith
Dragon.
The translators of the Authorized Version, apparently following the Vulgate, have rendered by the same word "dragon" the two Hebrew words tan and tannin, which appear to be quite distinct in meaning.
1. The former is used, always in the plural, in
Job 30:29; Ps 44:19; Isa 34:13; 43:20; Jer 9:11
It is always applied to some creatures inhabiting the desert, and we should conclude from this that it refers rather to some wild beast than to a serpent. The syriac renders it by a word which, according to Pococke, means a "jackal."
2. The word tannin seems to refer to any great monster, whether of the land or the sea, being indeed more usually applied to some kind of serpent or reptile, but not exclusively restricted to that sense.
Ex 7:9-10,12; De 32:33; Ps 91:13
In the New Testament it is found only in the Apocalypse,
etc., as applied metaphorically to "the old serpent, called the devil, and Satan."
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When Pharaoh speaketh unto you, saying, Give for yourselves a wonder; then thou hast said unto Aaron, Take thy rod, and cast before Pharaoh -- it becometh a monster.' And Moses goeth in -- Aaron also -- unto Pharaoh, and they do so as Jehovah hath commanded; and Aaron casteth his rod before Pharaoh, and before his servants, and it becometh a monster.
and they cast down each his rod, and they become monsters, and the rod of Aaron swalloweth their rods;
But Thou hast smitten us in a place of dragons, And dost cover us over with death-shade.
On lion and asp thou treadest, Thou trampest young lion and dragon.
And gone up her palaces have thorns, Nettle and bramble are in her fortresses, And it hath been a habitation of dragons, A court for daughters of an ostrich.
Honour me doth the beast of the field, Dragons and daughters of an ostrich, For I have given in a wilderness waters, Floods in a desolate place, To give drink to My people -- My chosen.
And I make Jerusalem become heaps, A habitation of dragons, And the cities of Judah I make a desolation, Without inhabitant.
And there was seen another sign in the heaven, and, lo, a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his head seven diadems, and his tail doth draw the third of the stars of the heaven, and he did cast them to the earth; and the dragon did stand before the woman who is about to bring forth, that when she may bring forth, her child he may devour;
And there came war in the heaven; Michael and his messengers did war against the dragon, and the dragon did war, and his messengers,
and the great dragon was cast forth -- the old serpent, who is called 'Devil,' and 'the Adversary,' who is leading astray the whole world -- he was cast forth to the earth, and his messengers were cast forth with him.
and the land did help the woman, and the land did open its mouth and did swallow up the river, that the dragon did cast forth out of his mouth; and the dragon was angry against the woman, and went away to make war with the rest of her seed, those keeping the commands of God, and having the testimony of Jesus Christ.
Watsons
DRAGON. This word is frequently to be met with in our English translation of the Bible. It answers generally to the Hebrew ??, ????, ????; and these words are variously rendered dragons, serpents, sea- monsters, and whales. The Rev. James Hurdis, in a dissertation relative to this subject, observes, that the word translated "whales," in Ge 1:21, occurs twenty-seven times in Scripture; and he attempts, with much ingenuity, to prove that it every where signifies the crocodile. That it sometimes has this meaning, he thinks is clear from Eze 29:3: "Behold, I am against thee, Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great dragon that lieth in the midst of his rivers." For, to what could a king of Egypt be more properly compared than the crocodile? The same argument he draws from Isa 51:9: "Art thou not he that hath cut Rahab, [Egypt,] and wounded the dragon?" Among the ancients the crocodile was the symbol of Egypt, and appears so on Roman coins. Some however have thought the hippopotamus intended; others, one of the larger species of serpents.
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And God prepareth the great monsters, and every living creature that is creeping, which the waters have teemed with, after their kind, and every fowl with wing, after its kind, and God seeth that it is good.
Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of Jehovah, Awake, as in days of old, generations of the ages, Art not Thou it that is hewing down Rahab, Piercing a dragon!