to pluck · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 2nd person masculine singular + pronominal suffix
witness
לְעֵ֣דle.'Ed
H5707
concretely · preposition + noun, common masculine singular absolute
leanness
כַ֝חֲשִׁ֗יkha.cha.Shi
H3585
literally a failure of flesh · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix
up
וַיָּ֥קָםvai.Ya.kom
H6965
to rise (in various applications · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
witness
יַעֲנֶֽהya.'a.Neh
H6030
properly · verb, qal imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
face
בְּפָנַ֥יbe.fa.Nai
H6440
the face (as the part that turns) · preposition + noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix
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
Job 10:17 Thou renewest thy witnesses against me, and increasest thine indignation upon me; changes and war are against me.
Job 19:20 My bone cleaveth to my skin and to my flesh, and I am escaped with the skin of my teeth.
Ruth 1:21 I went out full, and the LORD hath brought me home again empty: why then call ye me Naomi, seeing the LORD hath testified against me, and th…
Psalms 109:24 My knees are weak through fasting; and my flesh faileth of fatness.
Psalms 106:15 And he gave them their request; but sent leanness into their soul.
Isaiah 10:16 Therefore shall the Lord, the Lord of hosts, send among his fat ones leanness; and under his glory he shall kindle a burning like the burnin…
Isaiah 24:16 From the uttermost part of the earth have we heard songs, even glory to the righteous. But I said, My leanness, my leanness, woe unto me! th…
Ephesians 5:27 That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and withou…
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;…
filled . . . with wrinkles--Rather (as also the same Hebrew word in Job 22:16; English Version, "cut down"), "thou hast fettered me, thy witness" (besides cutting off my "band of witnesses," Job 16:7), that is, hast disabled me by pains from properly attesting my innocence. But another "witness" arises against him, namely, his "leanness" or wretched state of body, construed by his friends into a proof of his guilt. The radical meaning of the Hebrew is "to draw together," whence flow the double meaning "to bind" or "fetter," and in Syriac, "to wrinkle."
leanness--meaning also "lie"; implying it was a "false witness."
John Gill on Job 16:8
And thou hast filled me with wrinkles,.... Not through old age, but through affliction, which had sunk his flesh, and made furrows in him, so that he looked older than he was, and was made old thereby before his time; see Lamentations 3:4; for this is to be understood of his body, for as for his soul, that through the grace of God, and righteousness of Christ, was without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing:
which is a witness against me; as it was improved by his friends, who represented his afflictions as proofs and testimonies of his being a bad man; though these wrinkles were witnesses for him, as it may be as well supplied, that he really was an afflicted man:
and my leanness rising up…
"He exhausted me from fatigue, he misplaced my spirit and reduced me to dust. So that I do not raise my voice against you, God has broken my pride; he wants my madness to become wisdom.
Ver. 8. But now my grief has oppressed me, and my limbs are brought to nought. Holy Church is oppressed by her grief, when she beholds the wicked grow to a height in their wickedness; and whereas while the wicked increase, the weak too that are in her are set on to follow the bents of wickedness, it is rightly added, And all my limbs are brought to nought. For as the strong by 'bones,' so by 'limbs' the weak sort are wont to be denoted, and so 'the members of the Church are brought to nought,' when by the imitating of the wicked that are increased in this world, all the weak are worse weakened. For on seeing the prosperity of the wicked, they often slide away from their very stand in faith itself, they seek after temporal good things, and are in a manner 'brought to nought;' in that while they abandon the Being of God that is lasting, loving things that are transitory, they are, as it were, on their way to be not. And it is well said, But now my grief has oppressed me; in that the season of the grief of the Church is now, and the time of her joy shall follow hereafter. Now it often happens that Holy Church not only meets with unbelievers and those without her borders as her adversaries, but with difficulty bears with the plots and opposition of those too, whom she has within her.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Afflictions · Often severe — Often severe
Afflictions And Adversities · .Often severe — .Often severe
Diseases · Mentioned in scripture: Atrophy — Mentioned in scripture: Atrophy
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).
Keil & Delitzsch on Job 16:6-9
6 If I speak, my pain is not soothed;
And if I forbear, what alleviation do I experience?
7 Nevertheless now hath He exhausted me;
Thou hast desolated all my household,
8 And Thou filledst me with wrinkles - for a witness was it,
And my leanness rose up against me
Complaining to my face.
9 His wrath tore me, and made war upon me;
He hath gnashed upon me with His teeth,
As mine enemy He sharpeneth His eyes against me.
אם stands with the cohortative in the hypothetical antecedent clause Job 16:6, and in 6b the cohortative stands alone as Job 11:17; Psa 73:16; Psa 139:8, which is more usual, and more in accordance with the meaning which the cohortative has in itself, Ngelsbach, 89, 3. The inter…
Job’s family here means his extended household, including his servants (1:15-19).
Rashi on Job 16:8
You have shriveled me up; it has become a witness You have shriveled me up and blackened me for a witness, for it has become a witness to my iniquity, to accuse me.
