ability · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
hungerbitten
רָעֵ֥בra.'Ev
H7457
hungry (more or less intensely) · adjective, masculine singular absolute
destruction
וְ֝אֵ֗ידve.'Eid
H343
oppression · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular absolute
ready
נָכ֥וֹןna.Khon
H3559
properly · verb, niphal active participle, masculine singular absolute
side
צֵלָעtsêlâʻ
H6763
a rib (as curved)
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
1 Samuel 2:5 They that were full have hired out themselves for bread; and they that were hungry ceased: so that the barren hath born seven; and she that…
1 Samuel 2:36 And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left in thine house shall come and crouch to him for a piece of silver and a morsel of bre…
Job 15:23-24 He wandereth abroad for bread, saying, Where is it? he knoweth that the day of darkness is ready at his hand.
Psalms 7:12-14 If he turn not, he will whet his sword; he hath bent his bow, and made it ready.
Psalms 34:10 The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger: but they that seek the LORD shall not want any good thing.
Psalms 109:10 Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg: let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places.
Isaiah 8:21 And they shall pass through it, hardly bestead and hungry: and it shall come to pass, that when they shall be hungry, they shall fret themse…
1 Thessalonians 5:3 For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Job 18:11–end
Bildad here describes the destruction itself which wicked people are reserved for in the other world, and which, in some degree, often seizes them in this world. Come, and see what a miserable condition the sinner is in when his day comes to fall.
I. See him disheartened and weakened by continual terrors arising from the sense of his own guilt and the dread of God's wrath (Job 18:11, Job 18:12): Terror shall make him afraid on every side. The terrors of his own conscience shall haunt him, so that he shall never be easy. Wherever he goes, these shall follow him; which way soever he looks, these shall stare him in the face. It will make him tremble to see himself fought against by the whole cr…
The Hebrew is brief and bold, "his strength is hungry."
destruction--that is, a great calamity (Pro 1:27).
ready at his side--close at hand to destroy him (Pro 19:29).
John Gill on Job 18:12
His strength shall be hungerbitten,.... Or "shall be famine" (u), or hunger, that is, shall be weakened by it; famine is a sore evil, and greatly weakens thee natural strength of men; want of food will soon bring down the strength of the strongest man, when the stay and the staff, the sustenance and support of man's nature is taken from him: many of the Jewish writers, by "his strength", understand his children, who are, as Jacob said of Reuben, his might, and the beginning of his strength, Genesis 49:3; and when grown up are his protection and defence; and for these to be distressed with hunger, or destroyed by famine, is a sore judgment; so the Targum paraphrases it, his firstborn son; Jar…
12 His calamity looketh hunger-bitten,
And misfortune is ready for his fall.
13 It devoureth the members of his skin;
The first-born of death devoureth his members.
14 That in which he trusted is torn away out of his tent,
And he must march on to the king of terrors.
15 Beings strange to him dwell in his tent;
Brimstone is strewn over his habitation.
The description of the actual and total destruction of the evil-doer now begins with יהי (as Job 24:14, after the manner of the voluntative forms already used in Job 24:9). Step by step it traces his course to the total destruction, which leaves no trace of him, but still bears evident marks of being the fulfilment of the curse pronounced upon h…
The Church Fathers
"In the anxieties of hunger. Either those who follow him or those who obey him.
These words are appropriate to the impious but not at all to Job, because "pains have not destroyed him" but have made him appear to be a powerful fighter, have made him appear doubly just. Many have come, and "the soles of their feet have been devoured"; therefore, those who have come must complain about themselves and not about the righteous, because Job, thanks to his patience, deserves crowns and happiness.
Let his strength be hungerbitten, and starvation invade his ribs. After the manner of Holy Scripture, he has the appearance of wishing that which he foresees will be, not surely in the spirit of one uttering curses, but of one pronouncing prophesies. Thus every man, in that he consists of soul and flesh, is as it were made up of strength and weakness. For by virtue of that part, by which he was created a reasoning spirit, he is not improperly called 'strong,' but in respect of that, by which he is of a fleshly substance, he is weak. And so 'the strength' of man is the reasoning soul, which is able to resist by reason the tendencies to evil that assail it. And hence it is said again by blessed Job, Thou hast strengthened him for a while, that he might pass through for evermore. Since from a reasoning soul man derives it, that he should live for evermore. And so this wicked man's 'strength is hungerbitten,' in that his soul is not fed by any refreshment of the interior food. Of which same hunger God saith by the Prophet; I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the word of the Lord. And it is well added, And starvation invade his ribs. For the ribs lace in the bowels, that lying out of sight within they should be fortified by their solidity. And so the 'ribs' of every one are the senses of the mind, which fence the hidden thoughts. Therefore 'starvation invades the ribs,' when all spiritual refreshment being removed, the senses of the mind fail, and cannot either rule or guard their thoughts. 'Starvation invades the ribs' of the wicked man, in that the interior hunger debilitates the senses of the mind, that they may not rule their thoughts at all. For when the senses of the mind are dulled, the thoughts issue forth to things without, and, as it were, the ribs being weak, the bowels which might have lain in secret in a sound state, are poured forth without. Hence it comes that when the thoughts are spread abroad without, the mind being deceived goes after the image of exterior glory, and is pleased with nothing save what it beholds beautiful without.
Dictionary and topics
Death Of The Wicked, The · Frequently marked by terror — Frequently marked by terror
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).
