Leviathan Definitions

Webster's 1828 Dictionary

LEVI'ATHAN, n. [Heb.]
1. An aquatic animal, described in Job 41, and mentioned in other passages of Scripture. In Isaiah, it is called the crooked serpent. It is not agreed what animal is intended by the writers, whether the crocodile, the whale, or a species of serpent.
2. The whale, or a great whale.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

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

Merriam Webster's

noun Etymology: Middle English, from Late Latin, from Hebrew liwy?th?n Date: 14th century 1. a. often capitalized a sea monster defeated by Yahweh in various scriptural accounts b. a large sea animal 2. capitalized the political state; especially a totalitarian state having a vast bureaucracy 3. something large or formidable • leviathan adjective

English Explanatory Dictionary

?lev??e?t v.tr. 1 reduce to a fine smooth powder. 2 make a smoothpaste of. øølevigation n. [L levigare levigat- f. levis smooth]

Oxford Reference Dictionary

n. 1 Bibl. a sea-monster. 2 anything very large or powerful, esp. a ship. 3 an autocratic monarch or State (in allusion to a book by Hobbes, 1651). Etymology: ME f. LL f. Heb. liwyatan

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

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.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(leviathans) A leviathan is something which is extremely large and difficult to control, and which you find rather frightening. (LITERARY) Democracy survived the Civil War and the developing industrial leviathan and struggled on into the twentieth century. N-COUNT: usu sing

Easton's Bible Dictionary

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.

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia

le-vi'-a-than (liwyathan (Job 41:1-34), from [~lawah, "to fold"; compare Arabic name of the wry neck, Iynx torquilla, abu-luwa, from kindred lawa, "to bend"):

(1) The word "leviathan" also occurs in Isa 27:1, where it is characterized as "the swift serpent .... the crooked serpent"; in Ps 104:26, where a marine monster is indicated; also in Ps 74:14 and Job 3:8. The description in Job 41 has been thought by some to refer to the whale, but while the whale suits better the expressions denoting great strength, the words apply best on the whole to the crocodile. Moreover, the whale is very seldom found in the Mediterranean, while the crocodile is abundant in the Nile, and has been known to occur in at least one river of Palestine, the Zarqa, North of Jaffa. For a discussion of the behemoth and leviathan as mythical creatures, see EB, under the word "Behemoth" and "Leviathan." The points in the description which may well apply to the crocodile are the great invulnerability, the strong and close scales, the limbs and the teeth. It must be admitted that there are many expressions which a modern scientist would not use with reference to the crocodile, but the Book of Job is neither modern nor scientific, but poetical and ancient.

(2) See ASTRONOMY, sec. II, 2, 5.

Alfred Ely Day

Moby Thesaurus

argosy, bark, boat, bottom, bucket, craft, cyclopean, dinosaur, elephant, elephantine, enormous, gargantuan, giant, gigantic, hippo, hippopotamus, hooker, hulk, hull, immense, jumbo, keel, mammoth, mastodon, monster, packet, ship, tub, vessel, watercraft, whale