What Does Job 20:12 Mean?
Though harm is sweet in his mouth, though he hides it under his tongue;
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Though wickedness be sweet in his mouth, though he hide it under his tongue;THE KEY
A sweet taste can be the cover wickedness wears, not proof that it is harmless.
THE MEANING
Wickedness can taste sweet in your mouth while you keep it tucked beneath your tongue. The pleasure is real, and so is the concealment; the sweet taste does not dissolve what is hidden.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie this undoes is that pleasure proves something is good or harmless.
THE ROOT
תַּמְתִּיק
tamtiq
GROWS FROM
מָתַק
māṯaq
To be sweet; in this form, to make sweet or sweeten.
The Hebrew verb can carry the sense of sweetening wickedness in the mouth. The same root describes stolen water that tastes sweet and counsel taken together, showing that sweetness names an immediate experience, not a verdict on what is good.
ALSO GROWS
yimtaqu: They are sweet.
יִמְתָּקוּ
Proverbs 9:17 uses this form for stolen water, pairing the same root’s sweetness with secrecy.
namtiq: We sweeten; we take sweet counsel together.
נַמְתִּיק
Psalm 55:14 uses this root for shared counsel, showing that sweetness can describe what is taken into confidence as well as taste.
יַכְחִידֶנָּה
yakḥidennāh
GROWS FROM
כָּחַד
kāḥad
To conceal, hide, or withhold.
“hide” in this verse is yakḥidennāh. The verb depicts deliberate concealment: the hidden thing remains close under the tongue, still present and available to taste. Psalm 40:10 uses this root in “I have not hid” for refusing to withhold truth, so the root names the act of hiding rather than the moral character of what is hidden.
ALSO GROWS
nekhaḥed: We conceal; we hide.
נְכַחֵד
Psalm 78:4 uses this form in “We will not hide them from their children,” showing the same root can name deliberate withholding.
kiḥadti: I concealed.
כִּחַדְתִּי
Psalm 40:10 negates this form in “I have not hid,” using the root for refusing to conceal truth.
THE PATTERN
A pleasing surface can conceal a harmful or hidden reality.
Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in hiding is pleasant.The words of his mouth are smoother than butter, but war is in his heart. His words are softer than oil, yet they are opened swords.And in grasping for more, they trade you with molded words. Their judgment from of old does not idle, and their perishing does not nod.THE THREAD
Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in hiding is pleasant.The word rendered “sweet” in both verses comes from מתק (māṯaq), the root for being or making sweet. Proverbs joins that taste to stolen water and secret bread, making Job’s hidden sweetness part of a recurring image of pleasure entangled with concealment.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us