What Does Job 22:16 Mean?
Who are snatched away before their time, and whose foundation a flood pours over;
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
Which were cut down out of time, whose foundation was overflown with a flood:THE KEY
The root behind “cut down” also pictures contraction, so the verse renders a life ended before its time as a life compressed out of its span.
THE MEANING
The line holds two losses together: a life is cut short before its time, and the ground beneath it is overwhelmed by a flood. The destruction reaches from the span of life to the foundation that should support it.
THE ROOT
קֻמְּטוּ
qumməṭu
GROWS FROM
קמט
qāmaṭ
To contract or wrinkle; in this verse, to be cut off or seized.
“snatched away” in this verse is qumməṭu. The verb קמט (qāmaṭ), meaning “contract” or “wrinkle,” appears again for affliction drawing the body into wrinkles in Job 16:8. That shared image makes “cut down out of time” feel like a life compressed before its span is complete.
ALSO GROWS
wattiqməṭēnī: You have filled me with wrinkles (Job 16:8).
וַתִּקְמְטֵנִי
The same root pictures contraction in the body, making Job 22:16’s shortened lives feel drawn inward.
qumməṭu: They were cut off or contracted (Job 22:16).
קֻמְּטוּ
Here the contraction is of a life’s span: it ends before its time.
יְסוֹדָם
yesodam
GROWS FROM
יסד
yāsad
To set, establish, or lay a foundation.
The word for “foundation” comes from the verb “to establish”: it names what has been set in place to support what stands above. The flood reaches that very base, showing how deeply the overwhelm runs.
ALSO GROWS
yāsad: To establish or lay a foundation.
יָסַד
The noun “foundation” carries the action of setting something in place.
mūsād: Established or founded.
מוּסָד
This related form emphasizes something already set, deepening the shock of the flood reaching the base.
THE PATTERN
Scripture pictures overwhelming loss as both a shortened span and the collapse of what supports life.
You sweep them away like a flood. They are like sleep; in the morning they are like grass that passes on.But the one who hears and does not do is like a human who built a house on the ground without a foundation. The river burst against it, and at once it fell, and the breaking of that house was great.THE THREAD
You have crumpled me, and it stands as a witness against me. My thinness rises up in me and answers to my face.Job 16:8 uses the same root, קמט (qāmaṭ), meaning “to contract” or “wrinkle,” that appears behind “cut down” here. One verse shows contraction in the body; the other shows lives contracted out of their time.
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