Why do I take my flesh in my teeth, and put my life in my hand?
Read Chapter 13
George Leo Haydock
AD 1849
Why you seem to ask do I thus eagerly desire to die, (Haydock) as if I were tearing my own flesh, and exposing my soul to danger, (Worthington) like a madman? (Tirinus)
Is it not better for me to address myself to God, that he would hasten my departure, than thus to tear my flesh with my teeth? (Calmet)
Some have supposed that Job really did so in extreme anguish, (Ven. Bede) the leprosy occasioning such an insupportable irritation. (Haydock)
But the expression insinuates an interior anguish or despair; (Isaias xlix. 26.) in which sense Pythagoras enjoins, "not to eat the heart. "
Hands, in imminent danger of death, Psalm cxviii. 109.
St. Gregory explains it in a moral sense: "It is to manifest the intention of the heart by the actions. "(Haydock)
45. In Holy Scripture ‘teeth’ are sometimes used to be understood for the holy preachers, and sometimes for the interior senses [f]. Thus of the holy preachers it is said to the Bride, Thy teeth are like a flock of sheep that are even shorn, which came up from the washing. [Cant. 4, 2] And hence it is said to one of them, when the Gentiles were represented to him in a figure, Kill and eat [Acts 10, 13], i.e. ‘crush their oldness, and convert it into the body of the Church, i.e. into your own members.’ Again, that ‘teeth’ are wont to be understood of the interior senses, is testified by the Prophet Jeremiah, when he says, He hath broken my teeth by number. [Lam. 3, 16] For by the ‘teeth’ the food is broken in pieces, to allow of its being swallowed. Hence we not unjustly understand the interior senses by ‘teeth,’ which as it were chew and mince small the several particulars that occur to the mind, and transfer them to the belly of the memory, which the Prophet declares to be ‘br...
As those, Job says, who devour themselves have a consolation, as those who bite their flesh feel a certain relief in their sufferings, so it is the same with me, when I express myself in these terms, “And I may put my life in my hands.” Consider, above all, this sentence, “I may put my life in my hand.” This means, I will destroy myself! Like those who destroy themselves, I also find a consolation; and that is my consolation, if God does not cause me to perish, my consolation is to give expression to my thoughts. - "Commentary on Job 13.13–14b"
