James 4:9

εἰς κατήφειαν, ‘to heaviness,’ R.V., or dejection, κατήφεια, defined to be a mixture of shame and grief, lit. with downcast eye, perhaps from κατά and φάος, but deriv. uncertain. This is the natural expression of the painfulness of shame: “There is no outrage,” says Hawthorne, “more flagrant than to forbid the culprit to hide his face for shame, as it was the essence of this punishment (the pillory) to do.” It is a Homeric word: δυσμενέσιν μὲν χάρμα κατηφείην δέ σοι αὐτῷ, Il. III. 51, also Thuc. VII. 75 κατήφεια δέ τις ἅμα καὶ κατάμεμψις σφῶν αὐτῶν πολλὴ ἦν, Plut. Aemil. p. 267 A κατήφεια δὲ τὸ στρατόπεδον κατεῖχεν. For the thought comp. Proverbs 14:13 τελευταῖα δὲ χαρὰ (al. χαρᾶς) εἰς πένθος ἔρχεται, and Jeremiah 16:9 καταλύω ἐκ τοῦ τόπου τούτου φωνὴν χαρᾶς καὶ φωνὴν εὐφροσύνης.