Almanac › Beings & creatures

Rahab (the sea monster)

Hebrew רַהַב. Literally "storm, arrogance". Also called Rahav.

A sea monster God cut in pieces — and, confusingly, a name the prophets also use for Egypt.

Rahab is a creature of the deep that God is said to have cut in pieces and pierced. It is also, in Isaiah, a nickname for Egypt: a Rahab that sits still, all noise and no help. The two uses are related — the monster of the sea stands in for the empire across the sea — and the Exodus imagery of waters divided sits underneath both. This is not the Rahab of Jericho, whose name in Hebrew is a different word entirely.

Rahab (the sea monster)
“Isn’t it you who cut Rahab in pieces … who dried up the sea … a way for the redeemed to pass over?” (Isaiah 51:9–10).

Disputed. Used both for a sea creature and as a byname for Egypt, and the relationship between the two is a matter of reading rather than of statement. Not the same name as Rahab of Jericho.

Where it appears

All 84 almanac entries