Aha!

Aha! is an exclamation occurring in Scripture as an expression of triumphant mockery or malicious satisfaction at another's misfortune. Psalm 35:21 records the taunting cry of the psalmist's enemies — Aha, aha, our eye hath seen it — at his distress, and Psalm 40:15 and 70:3 use the same cry in pleas to God to shame those who rejoice at the speaker's trouble: Let them be desolate for a reward of their shame that say unto me, Aha, aha!

In Isaiah 44:16, the same interjection appears in a quite different register — the ironist's description of the idol-maker warming himself at the fire and exclaiming Aha, I am warm, I have seen the fire — before carving the remaining wood into a god to prostrate himself before. Here the exclamation is turned against its speaker, illustrating the absurdity of idol worship through the mundane self-satisfaction of the craftsman. In Job 39:25, the war horse's cry at the sound of the trumpet echoes the same vivid interjection of excited response.