The Meaning of Job 6:24 Explained

Job 6:24

KJV: Teach me, and I will hold my tongue: and cause me to understand wherein I have erred.

YLT: Shew me, and I -- I keep silent, And what I have erred, let me understand.

Darby: Teach me, and I will hold my tongue; and cause me to understand wherein I have erred.

ASV: Teach me, and I will hold my peace; And cause me to understand wherein I have erred.

KJV Reverse Interlinear

Teach  me, and I will hold my tongue:  and cause me to understand  wherein I have erred. 

What does Job 6:24 Mean?

Context Summary

Job 6:1-30 - "a Deceitful Brook"
The burden of Job's complaint is the ill-treatment meted out by his friends. They had accused him of speaking rashly, but they had not measured the greatness of his pain, Job 6:4, or they would have seen it to be as natural as the braying and lowing of hungry and suffering beasts, Job 6:5. A man would not take insipid food without complaint; how much more reason had he to complain whose tears were his meat day and night, Job 6:6-7! So bitter were his pains that he would welcome death, and exult in the throes of dissolution, Job 6:8-10. It could hardly be otherwise than that he should succumb, since he had only the ordinary strength of mortals, and both strength and wisdom were exhausted, Job 6:11-13.
Job next characterizes the assistance of his friends as winter brooks, turbid with melted ice and snow, which bitterly disappoint the travelers who had hoped to find water, and perish beside the dry heaps of stones, Job 6:17. They had found fault with his words, which, in the circumstances, were not a true index to his heart, Job 6:26; but a look into his face would have sufficed to attest his innocence of the sin of which they accused him, Job 6:28-30.
From these complaints of faithlessness and disappointment we turn to Him who, having been made perfect through suffering, has become "the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey Him," Hebrews 5:9. [source]

Chapter Summary: Job 6

1  Job shows that his complaints are not causeless
8  He wishes for death, wherein he is assured of comfort
14  He reproves his friends of unkindness

What do the individual words in Job 6:24 mean?

Teach me and I will hold my tongue and [in] what I have erred Cause to understand me
ה֭וֹרוּנִי וַאֲנִ֣י אַחֲרִ֑ישׁ וּמַה־ שָּׁ֝גִ֗יתִי הָבִ֥ינוּ לִֽי

ה֭וֹרוּנִי  Teach  me 
Parse: Verb, Hifil, Imperative, masculine plural, first person common singular
Root: יׄורֶה 
Sense: to throw, shoot, cast, pour.
וַאֲנִ֣י  and  I 
Parse: Conjunctive waw, Pronoun, first person common singular
Root: אֲנִי  
Sense: I (first pers.
אַחֲרִ֑ישׁ  will  hold  my  tongue 
Parse: Verb, Hifil, Imperfect, first person common singular
Root: חָרַשׁ 
Sense: to cut in, plough, engrave, devise.
וּמַה־  and  [in]  what 
Parse: Conjunctive waw, Interrogative
Root: לָמָּה 
Sense: what, how, of what kind.
שָּׁ֝גִ֗יתִי  I  have  erred 
Parse: Verb, Qal, Perfect, first person common singular
Root: שָׁגָה  
Sense: to go astray, stray, err.
הָבִ֥ינוּ  Cause  to  understand 
Parse: Verb, Hifil, Imperative, masculine plural
Root: בִּין  
Sense: to discern, understand, consider.
לִֽי  me 
Parse: Preposition, first person common singular