to yawn · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person common plural
mouth
בְּפִיהֶ֗םbe.fi.Hem
H6310
the mouth (as the means of blowing) · preposition + noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine plural
smitten
הִכּ֣וּhi.Ku
H5221
to strike (lightly or severely · verb, hiphil perfect, 3rd person common plural
cheek
לְחָיָ֑יle.cha.Yai
H3895
the cheek (from its fleshiness) · noun, common masculine dual construct + pronominal suffix
reproachfully
בְּ֭חֶרְפָּהBe.cher.pah
H2781
contumely · preposition + noun, common feminine singular absolute
gathered
יִתְמַלָּאֽוּןyit.ma.la.'Un
H4390
to fill or (intransitively) be full of · verb, hithpael imperfect, 3rd person masculine plural + paragogic nun
together
יַ֝֗חַדYa.chad
H3162
properly · noun, common masculine singular absolute
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Psalms 35:15 But in mine adversity they rejoiced, and gathered themselves together: yea, the abjects gathered themselves together against me, and I knew…
Psalms 22:13 They gaped upon me with their mouths, as a ravening and a roaring lion.
Isaiah 50:6 I gave my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: I hid not my face from shame and spitting.
Lamentations 3:30 He giveth his cheek to him that smiteth him: he is filled full with reproach.
Psalms 22:16-17 For dogs have compassed me: the assembly of the wicked have inclosed me: they pierced my hands and my feet.
Micah 5:1 Now gather thyself in troops, O daughter of troops: he hath laid siege against us: they shall smite the judge of Israel with a rod upon the…
Acts 23:2 And the high priest Ananias commanded them that stood by him to smite him on the mouth.
1 Kings 22:24 But Zedekiah the son of Chenaanah went near, and smote Micaiah on the cheek, and said, Which way went the Spirit of the LORD from me to spea…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Job 16:6-16
Job's complaint is here as bitter as any where in all his discourses, and he is at a stand whether to smother it or to give it vent. Sometimes the one and sometimes the other is a relief to the afflicted, according as the temper or the circumstances are; but Job found help by neither, Job 16:6. 1. Sometimes giving vent to grief gives ease; but, "Though I speak" (says Job), "my grief is not assuaged, my spirit is never the lighter for the pouring out of my complaint; nay, what I speak is so misconstrued as to be turned to the aggravation of my grief." 2. At other times keeping silence makes the trouble the easier and the sooner forgotten; but (says Job) though I forbear I am never the nearer;…
gaped--not in order to devour, but to mock him. To fill his cup of misery, the mockery of his friends (Job 16:10) is added to the hostile treatment from God (Job 16:9).
smitten . . . cheek--figurative for contemptuous abuse (Lam 3:30; Mat 5:39).
gathered themselves--"conspired unanimously" [SCHUTTENS].
John Gill on Job 16:10
They have gaped upon me with their mouth,.... Here Job speaks of the instruments which God suffered to use him ill; and he has respect to his friends who came with open mouth against him, loading him with calumnies and reproaches, laying charges to him he was not conscious of, and treating him with scorn and contempt, which such a gesture is sometimes a token of, Lamentations 3:46; and in which manner also Christ was used by men, on whom the reproach of them that reproached God and his people fell, and who exhibited false charges against him of various sorts; and he was the reproach of men and the contempt of the people, who laughed him to scorn, opened their mouths in derision; they shot ou…
10 They have gaped against me with their mouth,
In contempt they smite my cheeks;
They conspire together against me.
11 God left me to the mercy of the ungodly,
And cast me into the hands of the evil-doer.
He does not mean the friends by those who mock and vex him with their contemptuous words, but the men around him who envied his prosperity and now rejoice at his misfortune; those to whom his uprightness was a burden, and who now consider themselves disencumbered of their liege lord, the over-righteous, censorious, godly man. The perfects here also have not a present signification; he depicts his suffering according to the change it has wrought since it came upon him. The verb פּער is used…
The Church Fathers
"He has taken anger to reject me. It is well said, "He has taken anger," for he does not suffer the excesses. He rejected, as he rejects the proud. "He gritted his teeth against me. He overwhelmed me with his reproaches; the teeth, these are the words. "The arrows of his pirates came to hit me. These are the powers of the air: instruments to which God permits the testing of the righteous and chastising the wicked they are called pirates, because they harass us in our race on the sea of this world.
Ver. 10. They have gaped upon me with their mouth, reproaching me. Lost sinners open their mouths 'in reproaching,' when they at once do not fear to proclaim the mischiefs of their errors, and laugh to scorn the announcements of the right faith: with regard to whom be it known that they chiefly prosecute those in Holy Church, whom they see likely to be of service to many, who bruise the life of the carnal by the word of correction, and change them spiritually into the body of the Church. Hence it is added; They have smitten me upon the cheek; they have taken their fill of my punishments. For 'the cheek' of the Church, are the holy preachers, as where it is said under the figure of Judaea, by Jeremiah, She weepeth sore in the night, and the tears are on her cheeks. For in the adversities of the Church those mourn the most, who are used to crush the life of the carnal by preaching; for by these very persons Holy Church breaks and bruises the wicked to bad habits, and as it were swallowing them converts them into members of herself. Hence it is said to the first preacher himself too, as to a 'cheek' of the Church, Kill and eat. It is hence too that Samson laid hold of the jawbone of an ass, and destroyed his enemies; in that our Redeemer, with the Hand of His power laying hold of the simplicity and submissiveness of these that preach, killed the carnal to their bad habits. And the jawbone thrown down upon the earth, afterwards poured out water, in that the bodies of the preachers given over to death, shewed great miracles to the people. So the wicked 'smite the cheek' of Holy Church, when they persecute good preachers; and whereas lost sinners thus reckon themselves to have done something great, when they do put an end to the life of the preachers; after the striking of 'the cheek,' it is properly added, They have taken their fill of my punishments, for that punishment does fill them to satisfaction, which chastises the mind of the Church in an especial manner.
Dictionary and topics
Cheek — Smiting on the cheek was accounted a grievous injury and insult (Job 16:10; Lam. 3:30; Micah 5:1). The admonition (Luke 6:29), “Unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other,”…
Afflictions · Often severe — Often severe
Afflictions And Adversities · .Often severe — .Often severe
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
jeer and laugh at me: Job was the subject of mockery (cp. Ps 35:21; Isa 57:4; Lam 2:16; 3:46). • To slap the cheek was less an act of violence (Ps 3:7; Mic 5:1) than an insult (1 Kgs 22:24; Isa 50:6; Lam 3:30; Matt 26:67).
Rashi on Job 16:10
They open their mouth at me Heb. פערו, they open, like (Isa. 5:14), “and opened (ופערה) its mouth.”
they assemble Heb. יתמלאון, they gather, and there are many similar words in Scripture, e.g. (Jer. 12:6), “have called a gang (מלא) after you”; (Isa. 31:4), “although a band (מלא) of shepherds gather against him,” but it does not deviate from its original meaning because every filling (מלוי) is a gathering together.
Ver. 10. My wrinkles speak a testimony against me. What is denoted by 'wrinkles,' but doubledealing? and so all they are wrinkles of Holy Church, who therein live in doubledealing, who avouch the faith with their voices, disown it by their works. These persons doubtless in time of peace, because they see that with the powers of this world that faith is an honour, falsely feign themselves of the number of believers; but when a sudden storm of adversity disquiets Holy Church, they thereupon shew what they are going after in their heart of unbelief. Now these 'wrinkles' Holy Church has not in her Elect, in that they have not the art to shew one thing in themselves on the outside, and to hold another withinside. Whence the great Preacher says truly, That He might present it to Himself a glorious Church, not having spot or wrinkle. For she 'has not spot or wrinkle,' in that she is without both foulness of practice, and doubleness of tongue; but because now she holds within the bosom of the faith numbers even of the children of perdition, when the time of persecution blazes out, she bears those very persons for her enemies, whom she seemed before to be nourishing with words of preaching. Therefore let her say, My wrinkles speak a testimony against me; i.e. those very persons, while they persecute, inveigh against me, who now, being fixed in my body, do not mind in themselves the wickedness of their doubledealing. Whence it is rightly added yet further; And the liar is lifted up against my face, gainsaying me. Even in her time of peace Holy Church is subject to the 'liar,' in that there are numbers in her, who disbelieve in the promise of eternal life, and yet falsely feign themselves to be of the faithful. And as they do not dare openly to gainsay her preaching, she is exposed to the liar, not, as it were, 'before her face,' but behind her back; but when the time of wickedness breaks out, he who now disparages being full of apprehension, comes 'before the face to gainsay,' in that he withstands by open sentences of the voice the words of true faith. But it is to be known that when we meet with such things at the hands of carnal men, it is not so much they individually that rage cruelly in our death, as the evil spirit who rules their minds, as it is said by Paul, For we wrestle not against flesh and blood; but against principalities, against powers, against the…
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
