Job 16:10 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

They My friends, the instruments of God's anger; have gaped upon me with their mouth Have opened their mouths wide against me; either, 1st, To devour and destroy me, as a lion which falls upon its pray with open mouth: see Psalms 22:13-14, where these very expressions are used in the prediction of Christ's sufferings, of whom, in all this, Job was an eminent type. Or, 2d, To scoff and deride me, as it follows, and as this phrase is most commonly used: see Psalms 22:8; Psalms 35:21. They have smitten me upon the cheek reproachfully Hebrew, בחרפה, becherpeh, by reproach; or in a way of scorn and contempt, of which smiting on the cheek was a sign: see Lamentations 3:30; Micah 5:1. The meaning is, they have despised and derided me, the sign being put for the thing signified. They have gathered themselves together against me They are come from several places, and have met together here, not for me, or to comfort me, as they pretended; but really against me, and to grieve and torment me.