Dragon Tales

Fantasy

Do you believe in dragons? How about unicorns? Most people consider these and many other creatures the inventions of myth and legend. Some ferocious and amazing creatures have come from the imaginations of mere men. Consider the whole worlds devised by men such as Tolkien and Lewis, or even more so the whole universe created by George Lucas and those who have contributed to the Star Wars franchise. Most modern people who have been heavily influenced by bias toward scientific surety have cultivated a kind of rationalistic skepticism about the fantastic claim from the ancient past.

However, as Christians we are not materialists. What I mean is that while we do believe that there is consistency in the universe based on the way that God made the universe to conform to natural laws and patterns which He determined. We also believe that beyond this physical dimension is a realm even more real than those things that we can now touch and feel and see. This means that as believers we must not be so quick to assume that those things that our materialistic neighbors have attributed to myth do not really exist.

Defending Dragons

In the book of Job, when the Lord Himself is answering back to Job about his grasp of reality and truth, He references a couple of amazing creatures. First, God Himself describes a great beast named Behemoth (Job 40:16-24). From the description the animal sounds like what our modern experts would call a Brontosaurus. Of course this poses a problem because Paleontologists today would say that the Brontosaurus is a ‘prehistoric’ beast, but if these animals are prehistoric how would God have been able to reference it as an example for Job if Job had no experiential knowledge of the creature?  Another issue is if one takes an atheistic view that the Book of Job is simply a man made production then how did these ancient people know what a dinosaur looked like so as to be able to describe it so accurately? It would seem that the simplest answer is that the Behemoth which we call Brontosaurus did coexist with humanity from the beginning of creation and in the days of Job.

The second creature is far more unbelievable. This one is a gigantic sea monster with scales like armor, unimaginable power, and breath of fire. Now that description that I just gave you sounds like a fairytale dragon but it is a very accurate summary of the Bible’s description of the beast called Leviathan. I would like to encourage you to go read Job 41 and see if my summary is accurate. Leviathan sounds like a dragon. Now some people, even serious and sincere Bible scholars, would point out that Job is written in the genre of wisdom literature and poetry in the Hebrew text. Therefore, these folks would say that we must consider that the description may not have been meant to be taken literally. This is worth considering but I would argue that since God is using these beasts as an object lesson they must be real creatures. Also, while some of the description could possibly be hyperbolic, the underlying reality would still have to be true.

Even more important to our understanding of the Bible is that we as believers must cultivate a presupposition that assumes the reliability of the Bible. So that even when it comes to believing in dragons we are first committed to believe God as we seek to understand what he has revealed. I want to be clear. I am not saying that you have to conclude that Job is describing a dragon like Lancelot fought in the tales of Camelot. I am saying that we as believers must believe what God has said to the best of our ability, to understand and comprehend it. If you are convinced that the creature is only a literary device used by God to convey His point through Hebrew poetry, then ok as long we are not assuming that the Bible couldn’t be telling us about an actual dragon because we know those don’t exist. With our God nothing is impossible (Luke 1:37).

Another Dragon

The Bible does tell us about another dragon and this one is very real. In Revelation 12, John saw a great red dragon. This dragon was destructive, devastating, and dangerous. In John's vision the dragon is clearly seeking to destroy Christ and is set against Him even from His birth and before (Genesis 3:15). In verse 9 of Revelation 12, this dragon is identified as the ancient serpent who is called the devil and Satan. Now, this text is clearly symbolic, but the evil enemy is absolutely real. But the story of the Bible is the story of the hero who vanquishes this greatest of all villains and rescues His fair, beautiful, and pure maiden who becomes His glorious bride. And they lived happily ever after! Now read Revelation 19-22 with the view of this last sentence)

---