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leviathan |
4 definitions found From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) [web1913]: Leviathan \Le*vi"a*than\ (l[-e]*v[imac]"[.a]*than), n. [Heb. livy[=a]th[=a]n.] 1. An aquatic animal, described in the book of Job, ch xli., and mentioned in other passages of Scripture. Note: It is not certainly known what animal is intended, whether the crocodile, the whale, or some sort of serpent. 2. The whale, or a great whale. --Milton. From WordNet r 1.6 [wn]: leviathan n 1: the largest or most massive thing of its kind "it was a leviathan among redwoods"; "they were assigned the leviathan of textbooks" 2: monstrous sea creature symbolizing evil in the Old Testament From Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary [easton]: Leviathan a transliterated Hebrew word (livyathan), meaning "twisted," "coiled." In Job 3:8, Revised Version, and marg. of Authorized Version, it denotes the dragon which according to Eastern tradition, is an enemy of light; in 41:1 the crocodile is meant in Ps 104:26 it "denotes any large animal that moves by writhing or wriggling the body, the whale, the monsters of the deep." This word is also used figuratively for a cruel enemy, as some think "the Egyptian host, crushed by the divine power, and cast on the shores of the Red Sea" (Ps. 74:14). As used in Isa. 27:1, "leviathan the piercing [R.V. 'swift'] serpent, even leviathan that crooked [R.V. marg. 'winding'] serpent," the word may probably denote the two empires, the Assyrian and the Babylonian. From THE DEVIL'S DICTIONARY ((C)1911 Released April 15 1993) [devils]: LEVIATHAN, n. An enormous aquatic animal mentioned by Job. Some suppose it to have been the whale, but that distinguished ichthyologer Dr Jordan, of Stanford University, maintains with considerable heat that it was a species of gigantic Tadpole (_Thaddeus Polandensis_) or Polliwig -- _Maria pseudo-hirsuta_. For an exhaustive description and history of the Tadpole consult the famous monograph of Jane Potter, _Thaddeus of Warsaw_.
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