G785 ἀσπίς (aspís)

Asps (785) (aspis) describes a deadly serpent (Egyptian cobra) whose poison was contained in a bag under the lips! In the Greek writings and in the Septuagint (LXX) aspis was also used to describe a round shield (Lat. clipeus, of bull's hide, overlaid with metal plates, with a boss in the middle, and fringed with tassel) but "shield" is clearly not the meaning in the present verse. This is the only NT use of aspis but there are 17 uses in the Septuagint (LXX) (Deut. 32:33, 1Sa 17:6, 1Sa 17:45, 1 Chr. 5:18, 2Chr 9:16, Job 15:26, Job 20:14, Job 41:15, Ps 14:3, Ps 58:4, Ps 91:13, Ps 140:3, Isa 11:8, Isa 14:29, Isa 30:6, Isa 59:5, Jer 46:3) Vine writes that aspis was... a small and very venomous serpent, the bite of which is fatal, unless the part affected is at once cut away = metaphorically, of the conversation of the ungodly. In describing asps William Newell writes that "The fangs of a deadly serpent lie, ordinarily, folded back in its upper jaw, but when it throws up its head to strike, those hollow fangs drop down, and when the serpent bites, the fangs press a sack of deadly poison hidden "under its lips," at the root, thus injecting the venom into the wound. You and I were born with moral poison-sacks like this. And how people do claim the right to strike others with their venom-words! to use their snake-fangs!" (Romans 3: Devotional and Expositional) Lips (5491) (cheilos) means the physical part of the mouth or can refer to language or dialect in some contexts as in the present verse. This is a striking allusion to poison of asp which, like that of the common viper and other poisonous serpents, is lodged under the upper lip and at the inner end of two hollow fangs with which it bites and through which it infuses its venom. How the world desperately needs to sing the song of the redeemed, like Frances Ridley Havergal who wrote... Take my lips, and let them be Filled with messages for Thee. (Play hymn) Spurgeon has the following comments on Ps140:3: "They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent. The rapid motion of a viper’s tongue gives you the idea of its sharpening it; even thus do the malicious move their tongues at such a rate that one might suppose them to be in the very act of wearing them to a point, or rubbing them to a keen edge. It was a common notion that serpents inserted their poison by their tongues, and the poets used the idea as a poetical expression, although it is certain that the serpent wounds by his fangs and not by his tongue. We are not to suppose that all authors who used such language were mistaken in their natural history any more than a writer can be charged with ignorance of astronomy because he speaks of the sun’s traveling from east to west. Adders’ poison is under their lips. The deadliest of all venom is the slander of the unscrupulous. Our text, however, must not be confined in its reference to some few individuals, for in the inspired epistle to the Romans it is quoted as being true of us all. The old serpent has not only inoculated us with his venom, but he has caused us to be ourselves producers of the like poison: it lies under our lips, ready for us, and, alas, it is all too freely used when we grow angry, and desire to take vengeance upon any who have caused us vexation. It is sadly wonderful what hard things even good people will say when provoked. O Lord, take the poison-bags away, and cause our lips to drop nothing but honey. Selah. This is heavy work. Go up, go up, my heart! Sink not too low. Fall not into the lowest key. Lift up thyself to God." (Treasury of David) Honey on the lips, poison under them. Israel's first King, Saul, for example "said to David, ”Here is my older daughter Merab; I will give her to you as a wife, only be a valiant man for me and fight the Lord’s battles.” For Saul thought, “My hand shall not be against him, but let the hand of the Philistines be against him." (1Sa 18:17) Saul used the phrase "fight the LORD'S battles" he knew that would appeal to David. And yet Saul's offer came out of a treacherous (likely to betray trust) heart, desiring not good but evil and calamity for David. How interesting to see the similarity between Saul’s treachery and that of David with Uriah (read the tragic story in 1Samuel 11:1-15). Ray Stedman says that Poison...under their lips "is a picture of the tongue used to slander, to plant poison in another person's heart -- the put-down, the sharp, caustic words, the sarcasm that cuts someone off and depersonalizes another being. We are all guilty. This is what is inside, and this is what God sees with the realism of his eye." (Read full sermon Romans 3:9-26: Peale or Paul?) Paul's use of a snake also pictures sinful men as cunning and killing with their words. A minimum lethal dose of botulism bacillus is .00003 micrograms per kilogram of body weight. That is almost the equivalent of a flea derailing a 100 mile freight train. The venom of the tongue is probably not far removed in its killing power. Because of the spiritually damning false doctrines and the deceitful character of most of the religious leaders in Jesus’ day, both He and John the Baptist described them as broods of vipers. "When (John the Baptist) saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, "You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?" (Mt 3:7). As alluded to above, James writes that "the tongue is a small part of the body, and yet it boasts of great things. Behold, how great a forest is set aflame by such a small fire! And the tongue is a fire, the very world of iniquity; the tongue is set among our members as that which defiles the entire body, and sets on fire the course of our life, and is set on fire by hell. For every species of beasts and birds, of reptiles and creatures of the sea, is tamed, and has been tamed by the human race. But no one can tame the tongue; it is a restless evil and full of deadly poison. With it we bless our Lord and Father; and with it we curse men, who have been made in the likeness of God; from the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be this way." (James 3:5-10) There is a story of a man who found a baby rattlesnake and decided to make a pet of it. He kept it in the house and played with it for a week or so, but then it disappeared for several months and could not be found. One day the man reached behind a piece of furniture to retrieve something he had dropped. When he felt a sharp stab of pain, he pulled back his hand, with the rattler hanging from it by its fangs. Man’s sinful nature is equally untamable. Even those who belong to the Lord can succumb to terrible deceit. David, the divinely anointed king of Israel and a man after God’s own heart, became enamored of Bathsheba when he happened to see her bathing. Although he was told she was married, he nevertheless summoned her to the palace and had sexual relations with her. When she became pregnant and notified David, the king flashed the fangs of deceit by inviting her husband, Uriah, to a sumptuous banquet, giving the impression that this man was a valued friend. But David was determined to have Bathsheba for his own wife, and the next morning he sent her husband to the battlefront with a sealed note to the commander that contained Uriah’s own death warrant (2Sa 11:1-15). In The Pilgrims Progress John Bunyan talked about "the parson of our parish, Mr. Two-Tongues." In that same congregation was Mr. Smooth-Man, Mr. Anything, and Mr. Facing-Two-Ways. These are all people of duplicity. Even the famous have wicked tongues. The story is told of Winston Churchill who was a master at insulting with his tongue. It is well known that there was no love lost between he and Lady Astor. none was better at insults than Winston Churchill, who had no love affair with Lady Astor. On one occasion she found the great statesman rather obviously inebriated in a hotel elevator. With cutting disgust she snipped, "Sir Winston, you are drunk!" to which he replied, "M'lady, you are ugly. Tomorrow I will be sober." On another occasion Churchill and Lady Astor engaged in verbal sparring when she told him, "If I were your wife, I'd put arsenic in your tea." He responded, "If I were your husband, I'd drink it." Epitaph of our sinful "Tongue"... On a windswept hill in an English country churchyard stands a drab, gray slate tombstone. The quaint stone bears an epitaph not easily seen unless you stoop over and look closely. The faint etchings read: Beneath this stone, a lump of clay, Lies Arabella Young, Who on the twenty-fourth of May, Began to hold her tongue William Norris, the American journalist who specialized in simple rhythms that packed a wallop once wrote: If your lips would keep from slips, Five things observe with care: To whom you speak; of whom you speak; And how, and when, and where. Washington Irving once wrote that... The tongue is the only tool that grows sharper with constant use. Leonardo da Vinci said that... no member of our body needs so great a number of muscles as our tongue, for this member exceeds all the rest in the number of its movements. Publius, a Greek sage observed, “I have often regretted my speech, never my silence.” Ray Stedman adds that... "When man refuses to bend his will to the will of God, it begins to affect his talk. You can tell it in the tone of his voice, in the words he chooses, in the biting sarcasm that comes forth, in the curses and bitterness, in the foulness of the tongue oftentimes, in the jealousy that is evident there." (Read full sermon Romans 3:9-26: Peale or Paul?)