r to Bildad the Shuhite, he says--

"He divideth the sea with His power,
And by His understanding He smiteth through the proud. (R.V.
_Rahab_.)
By His spirit He hath garnished the heavens;
His hand hath formed the crooked serpent."

The passage gives a good example of the parallelism of Hebrew poetry;
the repetition of the several terms of a statement, term by term, in a
slightly modified sense; a rhyme, if the expression may be used, not of
sound, but of signification.

Thus in the four verses just quoted, we have three terms in each--agent,
action, object;--each appears in the first statement, each appears
likewise in the second. The third statement, in like manner, has its
three terms repeated in a varied form in the fourth.

Thus--

His power = His understanding.
Divideth = Smiteth through.
The sea = _Rahab_ (the proud).

And--

His spirit = His hand.
Hath garnished = Hath formed.
The heavens = The crooked serpent.

There can be no doubt as to the significance of the two parallels. In
the first, dividing the sea, _i. e._ the Red Sea, is the correlative of
smiting through _Rahab_, "the proud one," the name often applied to
Egypt, as in Isa. xxx. 7: "For Egypt helpeth in vain, and to no purpose:
therefore have I called her Rahab that sitteth still." In the second,
"adorning the heavens" is the correlative of "forming the crooked
serpent." The great constellation of the writhing dragon, emphatically a
"crooked serpent," placed at the very crown of the heavens, is set for
all the constellations of the sky.

There are several references to _Rahab_, as "the dragon which is in the
sea," all clearly referring to the kingdom of Egypt, personified as one
of her own crocodiles lying-in-wait in her own river, the Nile, or
transferred, by a figure of speech, to the Red Sea, which formed her
eastern border. Thus in chapter li. Isaiah apostrophizes "the arm of the
Lord."

"Art Thou not It that cut Rahab in pieces,
That pierced the dragon?
Art Thou not It that dried up the sea,
The waters of the great deep;
That made the depths of the sea a way for the redeemed to pass
over?"

And in Psalm lxxxix. we have--

"Thou rulest the raging of the sea;
When the waves thereof arise Thou stillest them.
Thou hast broken Rahab in pieces as one that is slain,
Thou hast scattere