In that day the LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent, even leviathan that crooked serpent; and he shall slay the dragon that [is] in the sea.
Ver. 1. In that day.] The day of God's great assize, and of execution to be done on the enemy and the avenger. Isa 26:21 Now we know how well people are pleased when princes do justice upon great offenders.
The Lord with his sore, and great, and strong sword.] Heb., With his sword, that hard or heavy one, and that great one, and that strong one, that is, with his Word, saith Oecolampadius, who by leviathan here understandeth the devil, who is elsewhere also called the "serpent and the great dragon." Revelation 12:9 ; Rev 20:2 But they do better, in my judgment, who by leviathan here understand some great tyrant, acted by the devil against the Church, such as was Pharaoh; Eze 29:3 Sennacherib; Isa 8:7 or Nebuchadnezzar; Jer 51:13 and at this day the Grand Signor, who hath swallowed up countries, as the leviathan or the whale doth fishes; for in the greatness of his empire is swallowed up both the name and empire of the Saracens, the most glorious empire of the Greeks, the empire of Trapezonum, the renowned kingdoms of Macedonia, Peloponnesus, Epirus, Bulgaria, Servia, Bosnia, Armenia, Cyprus, Syria, Egypt, Judea, Tunis, Algiers, Medea, Mesopotamia, with a great part of Hungary, as also of the Persian kingdom. His territories do somewhat resemble a long and winding serpent, as some learned men have observed; and for the slights and might which he useth against Christians still, who knows them not out of the Turkish story? God therefore will shortly take him to do, sharpening haply the swords of men, as he hath lately and marvellously done of the Venetians, as instrumental to ruin this vast empire, which laboureth with nothing more than the weightiness of itself.
And he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.] i.e., In fluctuante huius saeculi aesluario. a Of the strange length of dragons, see Aelian., lib. ii. cap. 21, and Plin., lib. viii. cap. 14. In the last year of the reign of Theodosius, senior, there was a dragon seen in Epirus, of that vast size that when he was dead eight yokes of oxen could hardly draw him. By dragon, some understand the same with leviathan, viz., the whale or whirlpool. The dragon is never satisfied with blood, though never so full gorged; no more are persecutors.
a Jun.