Job 31:10
in Job 31then may my own wife grind grain for another, and may other men sleep with her.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
Then let my wife grind unto another, And let others bow down upon her.
KJV
Then let my wife grind unto another, and let others bow down upon her.
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This verse in Job 31
Commentary
9 notes on this verseLet my wife grind unto another - Let her work at the handmill, grinding corn; which was the severe work of the meanest slave. In this sense the passage is understood both by the Syriac and Arabic. See Exo 11:5 (note), and Isa 47:2 (note); and see at the end of the chapter, Isa 31:8 (note). And let others bow down upon her - Let her be in such a state as to have no command of her own person; her owner disposing of her person as he pleases.
This site's exposition
my heart has been enticed
on Job 31:9-10
“If my heart has been enticed by my neighbor’s wife” names adultery specifically. Gill reads the grinding as the labor of a captive or slave, the fullest domestic humiliation Job can name. Clarke notes that the oath's severity matches the gravity the crime carries under the law Job cites.
This site's exposition
may my own wife grind grain
The wife who must grind grain for another is a slave at the handmill, Clarke says, and the Syriac and Arabic versions read it so. Henry compares 2 Samuel 12:11. There the sin of the husband was answered through his wife.
The record, by era
The Church Fathers1 voice
He did not say, my eyes, but, my heart; I never allowed, he says, my thoughts to become corrupted, or my body either. This is exactly what Christ says: "He who has cast his glance upon a woman to desire her has already committed adultery in his heart."
The Medieval Church2 voices
He seems justly punished who soils the wife of another by adultery, in that his wife also is soiled by others, and so he says, "let my wife be the prostitute of another," let her offer herself for sale to others. From this it follows …
Then let my wife be a harlot unto another, and let others bow down upon her. And if he ever had done this thing, he prays for that sin to be turned into punishment to him. And because it is generally the case that that thing which in the doing of, we do not well consider how heinous it is, in the suffering it we do consider this; the force of that atrocity which, if he were guilty, he declares that he himself ought to undergo, he makes plain by expressing it...
The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices
Let her be a slave (so some), a harlot, so others. God often punishes the sins of one with the sin of another, the adultery of the husband with the adultery of the wife, as in David's case ( 2 Sam. xii. 11 ), which does not in the least excuse the treachery of the adulterous wife; but, how unrighteous soever she is, God is righteous.
Then let my wife grind unto another,....
1 more voice on this verse
The Nineteenth Century1 voice
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
proposed
Then let my wife grined unto another - Let her be subjected to the deepest humiliation and degradation. Probably Job could not have found language which would have more emphatically expressed his sense of the enormity of this crime, or his perfect consciousness of innocence. The last thing which a man would imprecate on himself, would be that which is specified in this verse. The word “grind” (טחן ṭâchan) means to crush, to beat small; then to grind, as in a handmill; Jdg 16:21; Num 11:8. This was usually the work of females and slaves; see the notes at Isa 47:2. The meaning here is, “Let my wife be the mill-wench to another; be his abject slave, and be treated by him with the deepest indignity.” This passage has been understood by many in a different sense, which the parallelism might seem to demand, but which is not necessarily the true interpretation. The sense referred to is this: Cogatur uxor mea ad patiendum alius concubitum, ut verbum molendi hoc loco eodem sensu sumatur, quo non raro a Latinis usurpatur ut in illo Horatii (Satyr. L. i. Ecl. ii. verse 35), alienas permolere uxores. In this sense the rabbinic writers understand Jdg 16:21 and Lam 5:13. So also the Chaldee renders the phrase before us (חורן תשמשעם אנתתי) coeat cure alio uxor mea; and so the Septuagint seems to have understood it - ἀρέσαι ἄρα κὰι ἡ γυνή μου ἑτέρῳ aresai ara kai hē gunē mou heterō. But probably Job meant merely that his wife should be reduced to the condition of servitude, and be compelled to labor in the employ of another. We may find here an answer to the opinion of Prof. Lee (in his notes at Job 31:1), that the wife of Job was at this time dead, and that he was meditating the question about marrying again. […]
How the passage was read
What the Jewish commentators add
may my wife grind for someone else Our Sages explained this as an expression of sexual intercourse, as in (Jud.:21), “and he did grind in the prison house.”
1 more on this passage, in their own words ▾
For that is lewdness and I feared that if I committed it, that it is iniquity deserving punishment iniquity for which judgment of suffering is fit to come.
This section is reception history: how the passage was read and kept in the Jewish tradition. Where a reading parts from an essential of the Christian faith, the section says so at that point.
Texts and citation data: Sefaria; each excerpt follows its version’s licence. 3 further sources are cited on this chapter that carry no English text this site may quote or only restate the verse.
The words behind it
6 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| תִּטְחַ֣ן | titchan | let her grind | H2912 → | |
| לְאַחֵ֣ר | leacher | for another | H312 → | 166 times |
| אִשְׁתִּ֑י | ʾishti | wife my | H802 → | 781 times |
| וְ֝עָלֶ֗יהָ | vealeiha | and over her | H5921 → | 5755 times |
| יִכְרְע֥וּן | yikhreun | let them bow down ! | H3766 → | 36 times |
| אֲחֵרִֽין׃ | ʾacherin | others | H312 → | 166 times |
תִּטְחַ֣ןlet her grind
titchanH2912 →
לְאַחֵ֣רfor another
leacherH312 →166 times
אִשְׁתִּ֑יwife my
ʾishtiH802 →781 times
וְ֝עָלֶ֗יהָand over her
vealeihaH5921 →5755 times
יִכְרְע֥וּןlet them bow down !
yikhreunH3766 →36 times
אֲחֵרִֽין׃others
ʾacherinH312 →166 times
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
2 Samuel 12:11This is what the LORD says: ‘I will raise up adversity against you from your own house. Before your very eyes I will take your wives and give them to another, and he will…
it leads to
- 2 Samuel 16:21–22
Ahithophel replied, “Sleep with your father’s concubines, whom he has left to keep the palace. When all Israel hears that you have become a stench to your father, then the hands of all who…
- Deuteronomy 28:30
You will be pledged in marriage to a woman, but another man will violate her. You will build a house but will not live in it. You will plant a vineyard but will not…
- 2 Samuel 16:21–22
Through
Jeremiah 8:10Therefore I will give their wives to other men and their fields to new owners. For from the least of them to the greatest, all are greedy for gain; from prophet to priest, all…
it leads to
- Jeremiah 6:12–13
Their houses will be turned over to others, their fields and wives as well, for I will stretch out My hand against the inhabitants of the land,” declares the LORD.
- Jeremiah 6:12–13
Through
Deuteronomy 28:30You will be pledged in marriage to a woman, but another man will violate her. You will build a house but will not live in it. You will plant a vineyard but will not…
it leads to
- Amos 5:11
Therefore, because you trample on the poor and exact from him a tax of grain, you will never live in the stone houses you have built; you will never drink the wine from the…
- Jeremiah 8:10
Therefore I will give their wives to other men and their fields to new owners. For from the least of them to the greatest, all are greedy for gain; from prophet to priest, all…
- Amos 5:11
Through
Exodus 11:5and every firstborn son in the land of Egypt will die, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sits on his throne, to the firstborn of the servant girl behind the hand mill, as well…
it leads to
- Psalms 78:51
He struck all the firstborn of Egypt, the virility in the tents of Ham.
- Psalms 78:51
Through
Isaiah 47:2Take millstones and grind flour; remove your veil; strip off your skirt, bare your thigh, and wade through the streams.
it leads to
- Matthew 24:41
Two women will be grinding at the mill: one will be taken and the other left.
- Judges 16:21
Then the Philistines seized him, gouged out his eyes, and brought him down to Gaza, where he was bound with bronze shackles and forced to grind grain in the prison.
- Matthew 24:41
Where this verse is studied
About Job
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Gregory the Dialogist, Morals on the Book of Job, Book XXI; John Chrysostom, COMMENTARY ON JOB 31:8-10; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763); Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible and Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Job.