Did I fear a great multitude, or did the contempt of families terrify me, that I kept silence, and went not out of the door? Did I fear a great multitude - Was I ever prevented by the voice of the many from decreeing and executing what was right? When many families or tribes espoused a particular cause, which I found, on examination, to be wrong, did they put me in fear, so as to prevent me from doing justice to the weak and friendless? Or, in any of these cases, was I ever, through fear, self-seeking, or favor, prevented from declaring my mind, or constrained to keep my house, lest I should be obliged to give judgment against my conscience? Mr. Good thinks it an imprecation upon himself, if he had done any of the evils which he mentions in the preceding verse. He translates thus: -
"Then let me be confounded before the assembled multitude,
And let the reproach of its families quash me!
Yea, let me be struck dumb! let me never appear abroad!"
I am satisfied that Job 31:38-40, should come in either here, or immediately after Job 31:25; and that Job's words should end with Job 31:37, which, if the others were inserted in their proper places, would be Job 31:40. See the reasons at the end of the chapter, Job 31:40 (note).