The words of a whisperer are like delicious morsels; they go down into the inner parts of the body.
Tale-bearers are those who secretly carry stories from house to house, which perhaps have some truth in them, but are secrets not fit to be told, or are basely misrepresented, and false colours put upon them, and are all told with design to blast men's reputation, to break their friendship, to make mischief between relations and neighbours, and set them at variance.
The words of a talebearer are as wounds,.... Or rather they are wounds; they wound the credit and reputation of the person of whom the tale is told; they wound the person to whom it is told, and destroy his love and affection to his friend; and in the issue they wound, hurt, and ruin the talebearer himself.
(Compare Pro 16:28). as wounds--not sustained by the Hebrew; better, as "sweet morsels," which men gladly swallow. innermost . . . belly--the mind, or heart (compare Pro 20:27-30; Psa 22:14).