What Does Job 5:16 Mean?
So the emptied one has hope, and crookedness shuts its mouth.
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
So the poor hath hope, and iniquity stoppeth her mouth.THE KEY
Hope belongs to the lowly, and injustice’s mouth is the one that closes.
THE MEANING
The low condition around you does not erase expectation; the poor still have hope. Injustice is not the final speaker: its mouth closes. Need is real, and wrongdoing’s voice has a limit.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that poverty leaves nothing to hope for and that injustice can speak without limit.
THE ROOT
קָפְצָה
qafetsah
GROWS FROM
קפץ
qafats
To close, shut, or clench.
“shuts” in this verse is qafetsah. The verb carries a concrete image of closure: iniquity’s mouth is shut. The same root describes shutting a hand against a poor person, linking this closed mouth with the withholding of aid.
ALSO GROWS
qafats: To shut, close, or clench.
קָפַץ
This is the root verb behind the image of iniquity’s mouth closing.
tiqpotz: You shut or close; used of shutting the hand.
תִּקְפֹּץ
In Deuteronomy 15:7, the same root describes closing a hand against a poor brother, connecting the verse’s silenced mouth with the act of withholding help.
תִּקְוָה
tiqvah
GROWS FROM
קוה
qavah
To wait for, look toward, or expect; related forms also carry the sense of gathering.
The poor person’s hope is expectation directed toward what is ahead. The same noun can also name a cord, giving hope the image of a line held through low circumstances.
ALSO GROWS
qavah: To wait for, hope, or expect.
קָוָה
The verb shows hope as directed waiting, not merely a passing feeling.
miqveh: A gathering or pool.
מִקְוֶה
This related form carries the root’s sense of gathering, suggesting expectation that can collect and hold together.
tiqvah: Hope; also used for a cord.
תִּקְוָה
The cord sense lets hope appear as a line held toward what is coming.
דַּל
dal
GROWS FROM
דלל
dalal
To hang low, be reduced, or become weak.
“emptied” in this verse is dal. The word for the poor grows from a root of being brought low or diminished. Yet the verse attaches hope directly to that low place: reduced status does not erase expectation.
ALSO GROWS
dal: Lowly, weak, or poor.
דַּל
This is the person the verse places in direct relation to hope.
dalal: To hang low, diminish, or become weak.
דָּלַל
The verb makes visible the lowered condition carried by the word for the poor.
dallut: Poverty or a low condition.
דַּלּוּת
This noun shows the same root extending from a person’s condition to the state of being reduced.
THE PATTERN
The lowly retain expectation while injustice is brought to the point of silence.
For the needy is not always forgotten; the hope of the bowed ones does not perish forever.The straight ones see it and rejoice, and all crookedness shuts its mouth.He has pulled the mighty down from their seats, and lifted up the low.THE THREAD
The straight ones see it and rejoice, and all crookedness shuts its mouth.The Hebrew verb קָפְצָה (qafetsah, “closed”) is the same in both verses, carrying the image of iniquity closing its own mouth. Job joins that closure to hope for the poor; the psalm shows the same silencing as something the righteous see and rejoice over.
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