Job 41:12

"I will not keep silence concerning his limbs,

Nor his mighty strength, nor his goodly frame.

Who can strip off his outer garment?

Who shall come within his jaws?

Who can open the doors of his face?

Round about his teeth is terror.

His strong scales are his pride,

Shut up together as with a close seal.

One is so near to another,

That no air can come between them.

They are joined one to another;

They stick together so that they cannot be sundered."

"His mighty strength ... etc." (Job 41:12). Driver, and other scholars, have complained that the text here is corrupt;[15] but one thing is clear, the mighty strength of the crocodile is stressed. Moreover, the crocodile of the Old Testament was a full 18 feet in length,[16] contrasting with the American crocodile some four feet shorter.

"Who can open the doors of his face? Round about his teeth is terror" (Job 41:14). "`The doors of his face,' his lower and upper jaws. `Round his teeth is terror,' in the upper jaw usually 36, in the lower jaw 20, long and terrible to look at."[17] Rowley, however, wrote that, "The formidable teeth of the crocodile inspire terror; in the upper jaw, there are thirty-six, and in the lower thirty"![18] This writer must confess that he does not know which one of these scholars is correct regarding the number of crocodile teeth in that lower jaw!

"His strong scales are his pride" (Job 41:15). "These plates are of exceeding hardness, so hard, that they were employed as armour by ancient warriors, and one may see a coat of natural scale armour in the British Museum."[19] "The skin (scales) of the crocodile is actually so hard that a musket ball will not penetrate it."[20]