{"commentary":{"id":"keil-delitzsch","name":"Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary","website":"https://worthy.bible/commentaries/keil-delitzsch-commentary","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"bb5cc0f9cfe0a93b3c903bb6972c6bc8c4e9f2bd3be6c2a6d276737cf9c5edce","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":39,"totalNumberOfChapters":909,"totalNumberOfVerses":6516,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"PRO","commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","name":"Proverbs","commonName":"Proverbs","introduction":"The Book of Proverbs\n\nIntroduction\n\nThe Book of Proverbs bears the external title ספר משׁלי, which it derives from the words with which it commences. It is one of the three books which are distinguished from the other twenty-one by a peculiar system of accentuation, the best exposition of which that has yet been given is that by S. Baer,\n\n(Note: Cf. Outlines of Hebrew Accentuation, Prose and Poetical, by Rev. A. B. Davidson, D.D., Professor of Hebrew, Free Church College, Edinburgh, 1861, based on Baer's Torath Emeth, Rdelheim 1872.)\n\nas set forth in my larger Psalmen-commentar\n\n(Note: Vol. ii., ed. of 1860, pp. 477-511).\n\nThe memorial word for these three books, viz., Job, Mishle (Proverbs), and Tehillim (Psalms), is אמת, formed from the first letter of the first word of each book, or, following the Talmudic and Masoretic arrangement of the books, תאם.\n\nHaving in view the superscription משׁלי שׁלמת, with which the book commences, the ancients regarded it as wholly the composition of Solomon. The circumstance that it contains only 800 verses, while according to Kg1 5:12 (Kg1 4:32) Solomon spake 3000 proverbs, R. Samuel bar-Nachmani explains by remarking that each separate verse may be divided into two or three allegories or apothegms (e.g., Pro 25:12), not to mention other more arbitrary modes of reconciling the discrepancy.\n\n(Note: Pesikta, ed. Buber (1868), 34b, 35a. Instead of 800, the Masora reckons 915 verses in the Book of Proverbs.)\n\nThe opinion also of R. Jonathan, that Solomon first composed the Canticles, then the Proverbs, and last of all Ecclesiastes, inasmuch as the first corresponds\n\n(Note: Schir-ha-Schirim Rabba, c. i.f. 4a.)\n\nwith the spring-time of youth, the second with the wisdom of manhood, and the third with the disappointment of old age, is founded on the supposition of the unity of the book and of its Solomonic authorship.\n\nAt the present day also there are some, such as Stier, who regard the Book of Proverbs from first to last as the work of Solomon, just as Klauss (1832) and Randegger (1841) have ventured to affirm that all the Psalms without exception were composed by David. But since historical criticism has been applied to Biblical subjects, that blind submission to mistaken tradition appears as scarcely worthy of being mentioned. The Book of Proverbs presents itself as composed of various parts, different from each other in character and in the period to which they belong. Under the hands of the critical analysis it resolves itself into a mixed market of the most manifold intellectual productions of proverbial poetry, belonging to at least three different epochs.\n\n1. The External Plan of the Book of Proverbs, and Its Own Testimony as to Its Origin\n\nThe internal superscription of the book, which recommends it, after the manner of later Oriental books, on account of its importance and the general utility of its contents, extends from Pro 1:1 to Pro 1:6. Among the moderns this has been acknowledged by Lwenstein and Maurer; for Pro 1:7, which Ewald, Bertheau, and Keil have added to it, forms a new commencement to the beginning of the book itself. The book is described as \"The Proverbs of Solomon,\" and then there is annexed the statement of its object. That object, as summarily set forth in Pro 1:2, is practical, and that in a twofold way: partly moral, and partly intellectual. The former is described in Pro 1:3-5. It presents moral edification, moral sentiments for acceptance, not merely to help the unwise to attain to wisdom, but also to assist the wise. The latter object is set forth in Pro 1:6. It seeks by its contents to strengthen and discipline the mind to the understanding of thoughtful discourses generally. In other words, it seeks to gain the moral ends which proverbial poetry aims at, and at the same time to make familiar with it, so that the reader, in these proverbs of Solomon, or by means of them as of a key, learns to understand such like apothegms in general. Thus interpreted, the title of the book does not say that the book contains proverbs of other wise men besides those of Solomon; if it did so, it would contradict itself. It is possible that the book contains proverbs other than those of Solomon, possible that the author of the title of the book added such to it himself, but the title presents to view only the Proverbs of Solomon. If Pro 1:7 begins the book, then after reading the title we cannot think otherwise than that here begin the Solomonic proverbs. If we read farther, the contents and the form of the discourses which follow do not contradict this opinion; for both are worthy of Solomon. So much the more astonished are we, therefore, when at Pro 10:1 we meet with a new superscription, משׁלי שׁלמה, from which point on to Pro 22:16 there is a long succession of proverbs of quite a different tone and form - short maxims, Mashals proper - while in the preceding section of the book we find fewer proverbs than monitory discourses. What now must be our opinion when we look back from this second superscription to the part 1:7-9:18, which immediately follows the title of the book? Are 1:7-9:18, in the sense of the book, not the \"Proverbs of Solomon\"? From the title of the book, which declares them to be so, we must judge that they are. Or are they \"Proverbs of Solomon\"? In this case the new superscription (Pro 10:1), \"The Proverbs of Solomon,\" appears altogether incomprehensible. And yet only one of these two things is possible: on the one side, therefore, there must be a false appearance of contradiction, which on a closer investigation disappears. But on which side is it? If it is supposed that the tenor of the title, Pro 1:1-6, does not accord with that of the section 10:1-22:6, but that it accords well with that of 1:7-9:18 (with the breadth of expression in 1:7-9:18, it has also several favourite words not elsewhere occurring in the Book of Proverbs; among these, ערמה, subtilty, and מזמּה, discretion, Pro 1:4), then Ewald's view is probable, that chap. 1-9 is an original whole written at once, and that the author had no other intention than to give it as an introduction to the larger Solomonic Book of Proverbs beginning at Pro 10:1. But it is also possible that the author of the title has adopted the style of the section Prov 1:7-9:18. Bertheau, who has propounded this view, and at the same time has rejected, in opposition to Ewald, the idea of the unity of the section, adopts this conclusion, that in 1:8-9:18 there lies before us a collection of the admonitions of different authors of proverbial poetry, partly original introductions to larger collections of proverbs, which the author of the title gathers together in order that he may give a comprehensive introduction to the larger collection contained in 10:1-22:16. But such an origin of the section as Bertheau thus imagines is by no means natural; it is more probable that the author, whose object is, according to the title of the book, to give the proverbs of Solomon, introduces these by a long introduction of his own, than that, instead of beginning with Solomon's proverbs, he first presents long extracts of a different kind from collections of proverbs. If the author, as Bertheau thinks, expresses indeed, in the words of the title, the intention of presenting, along with the \"Proverbs of Solomon,\" also the \"words of the wise,\" then he could not have set about his work more incorrectly and self-contradictorily than if he had begun the whole, which bears the superscription \"Proverbs of Solomon\" (which must be regarded as presenting the proverbs of Solomon as a key to the words of the wise generally), with the \"words of the wise.\" But besides the opinion of Ewald, which in itself, apart from internal grounds, is more natural and probable than that of Bertheau, there is yet the possibility of another. Keil, following H. A. Hahn, is of opinion, that in the sense of the author of the title, the section 1-9 is Solomonic as well as 10-22, but that he has repeated the superscription \"Proverbs of Solomon\" before the latter section, because from that point onward proverbs follow which bear in a special measure the characters of the Mashal (Hvernick's Einl. iii. 428). The same phenomenon appears in the book of Isaiah, where, after the general title, there follows an introductory address, and then in Isa 2:1 the general title is repeated in a shorter form. That this analogy, however, is here inapplicable, the further discussion of the subject will show.\n\nThe introductory section Prov 1:7-9:18, and the larger section 10:1-22:16, which contains uniform brief Solomonic apothegms, are followed by a third section, 22:17-24:22. Hitzig, indeed, reckons 10:1-24:22 as the second section, but with Pro 22:17 there commences an altogether different style, and a much freer manner in the form of the proverb; and the introduction to this new collection of proverbs, which reminds us of the general title, places it beyond a doubt that the collector does not at all intend to set forth these proverbs as Solomonic. It may indeed be possible that, as Keil (iii. 410) maintains, the collector, inasmuch as he begins with the words, \"Incline thine ear and hear words of the wise,\" names his own proverbs generally as \"words of the wise,\" especially since he adds, \"and apply thine heart to my knowledge;\" but this supposition is contradicted by the superscription of a fourth section, Pro 24:23., which follows. This short section, an appendix to the third, bears the superscription, \"These things also are לחכמים.\" If Keil thinks here also to set aside the idea that the following proverbs, in the sense of this superscription, have as their authors \"the wise,\" he does unnecessary violence to himself. The ל is here that of authorship and if the following proverbs are composed by the חכמים, \"the wise,\" then they are not the production of the one חכם, \"wise man,\" Solomon, but they are \"the words of the wise\" in contradistinction to \"the Proverbs of Solomon.\"\n\nThe Proverbs of Solomon begin again at Pro 25:1; and this second large section (corresponding to the first, 10:1-22:16) extends to chap. 29. This fifth portion of the book has a superscription, which, like that of the preceding appendix, commences thus: \"Also (גּם) these are proverbs of Solomon which the men of Hezekiah king of Judah collected.\" The meaning of the word העתּיקוּ is not doubtful. It signifies, like the Arameo-Arabic נסח, to remove from their place, and denote that the men of Hezekiah removed from the place where they found them the following proverbs, and placed them together in a separate collection. The words have thus been understood by the Greek translator. From the supplementary words αἱ ἀδιάκριτοι (such as exclude all διάκρισις) it is seen that the translator had a feeling of the important literary historical significance of that superscription, which reminds us of the labours of the poetical grammarians appointed by Pisitratus to edit older works, such as those of Hesiod. The Jewish interpreters, simply following the Talmud, suppose that the \"also\" (גּם) belongs to the whole superscription, inclusive of the relative sentence, and that it thus bears witness to the editing of the foregoing proverbs also by Hezekiah and his companions;\n\n(Note: Vid., B. Bathra, 15a. From the fact that Isaiah outlived Hezekiah it is there concluded that the Hezekiah-collegium also continued after Hezekiah's death. Cf. Frst on the Canon of the O.T. 1868, p. 78f.)\n\nwhich is altogether improbable, for then, if such were the meaning of the words, \"which the men of Hezekiah,\" etc., they ought to have stood after Pro 1:1. The superscription Pro 25:1 thus much rather distinguishes the following collection from that going before, as having been made under Hezekiah. As two appendices followed the \"Proverbs of Solomon,\" 10:1-22:16, so also two appendices the Hezekiah-gleanings of Solomonic proverbs. The former two appendices, however, originate in general from the \"wise,\" the latter more definitely name the authors: the first, chap. 30, is by \"Agur the son of Jakeh;\" the second, Pro 31:1-9, by a \"King Lemuel.\" In so far the superscriptions are clear. The name of the authors, elsewhere unknown, point to a foreign country; and to this corresponds the peculiar complexion of these two series of proverbs. As a third appendix to the Hezekiah-collection, Pro 31:10. follows, a complete alphabetical proverbial poem which describes the praiseworthy qualities of a virtuous woman.\n\nWe are thus led to the conclusion that the Book of Proverbs divides itself into the following parts: - (1) The title of the book, Pro 1:1-6, by which the question is raised, how far the book extends to which it originally belongs; (2) the hortatory discourses, 1:7-9:18, in which it is a question whether the Solomonic proverbs must be regarded as beginning with these, or whether they are only the introduction thereto, composed by a different author, perhaps the author of the title of the book; (3) the first great collection of Solomonic proverbs, 10:1-22:16; (4) the first appendix to this first collection, \"The words of the wise,\" 22:17-24:22; (5) the second appendix, supplement of the words of some wise men, Pro 24:23.; (6) the second great collection of Solomonic proverbs, which the \"men of Hezekiah\" collected, chap. 25-29; (7) the first appendix to this second collection, the words of Agur the son of Makeh, chap. 30; (8) the second appendix, the words of King Lemuel, Pro 31:1-9; (9) third appendix, the acrostic ode, Pro 31:10. These nine parts are comprehended under three groups: the introductory hortatory discourses with the general title at their head, and the two great collections of Solomonic proverbs with their two appendices. In prosecuting our further investigations, we shall consider the several parts of the book first from the point of view of the manifold forms of their proverbs, then of their style, and thirdly of their type of doctrine. From each of these three subjects of investigation we may expect elucidations regarding the origin of these proverbs and of their collections.\n\n2. The Several Parts of the Book of Proverbs with Respect to the Manifold Forms of the Proverbs\n\nIf the Book of Proverbs were a collection of popular sayings, we should find in it a multitude of proverbs of one line each, as e.g., \"Wickedness proceedeth from the wicked\" (Sa1 24:13); but we seek for such in vain. At the first glance, Pro 24:23 appears to be a proverb of one line; but the line \"To have respect of persons in judgment is not good,\" is only the introductory line of a proverb which consists of several lines, Pro 24:24. Ewald is right in regarding as inadmissible a comparison of the collections of Arabic proverbs by Abu-Obeida, Meidani, and others, who gathered together and expounded the current popular proverbs, with the Book of Proverbs. Ali's Hundred Proverbs are, however, more worthy of being compared with it. Like these, Solomon's proverbs are, as a whole, the production of his own spirit, and only mediately of the popular spirit. To make the largeness of the number of these proverbs a matter of doubt were inconsiderate. Eichhorn maintained that even a godlike genius scarcely attains to so great a number of pointed proverbs and ingenious thoughts. But if we distribute Solomon's proverbs over his forty years' reign, then we have scarcely twenty for each year; and one must agree with the conclusion, that the composition of so many proverbs even of the highest ingenuity is no impossible problem for a \"godlike genius.\" When, accordingly, it is related that Solomon wrote 3000 proverbs, Ewald, in his History of Israel, does not find the number too great, and Bertheau does not regard it as impossible that the collection of the \"Proverbs of Solomon\" has the one man Solomon as their author. The number of the proverbs thus cannot determine us to regard them as having for the most part originated among the people, and the form in which they appear leads to an opposite conclusion. It is, indeed, probable that popular proverbs are partly wrought into these proverbs,\n\n(Note: Isaac Euchel (1804), in his Commentary on the Proverbs, regards Pro 14:4 and Pro 17:19 as such popular proverbs.)\n\nand many of their forms of expression are moulded after the popular proverbs; but as they thus lie before us, they are, as a whole, the production of the technical Mashal poetry.\n\nThe simplest form is, according to the fundamental peculiarity of the Hebrew verse, the distich. The relation of the two lines to each other is very manifold. The second line may repeat the thought of the first, only in a somewhat altered form, in order to express this thought as clearly and exhaustively as possible. We call such proverbs synonymous distichs; as e.g., Pro 11:25 :\n\nA soul of blessing is made fat,\n\nAnd he that watereth others is himself watered.\n\nOr the second line contains the other side of the contrast to the statement of the first; the truth spoken in the first is explained in the second by means of the presentation of its contrary. We call such proverbs antithetic distichs; as e.g., Pro 10:1 :\n\nA wise son maketh his father glad,\n\nAnd a foolish son is his mother's grief.\n\nSimilar forms, Pro 10:16; Pro 12:5. Elsewhere, as Pro 18:14; Pro 20:24, the antithesis clothes itself in the form of a question. sometimes it is two different truths that are expressed in the two lines; and the authorization of their union lies only in a certain relationship, and the ground of this union in the circumstance that two lines are the minimum of the technical proverb - synthetic distichs; e.g., Pro 10:18 :\n\nA cloak of hatred are lying lips,\n\nAnd he that spreadeth slander is a fool.\n\nNot at all infrequently one line does not suffice to bring out the thought intended, the begun expression of which is only completed in the second. These we call integral (eingedankige) distichs; as e.g., Pro 11:31 (cf. Pe1 4:18):\n\nThe righteous shall be recompensed on the earth -\n\nHow much more the ungodly and the sinner!\n\nTo these distichs also belong all those in which the thought stated in the first receives in the second, by a sentence presenting a reason, or proof, or purpose, or consequence, a definition completing or perfecting it; e.g., Pro 13:14; Pro 16:10; Pro 19:20; Pro 22:28.\n\n(Note: Such integral distichs are also Pro 15:3; Pro 16:7, Pro 16:10; Pro 17:13, Pro 17:15; Pro 18:9, Pro 18:13; Pro 19:26-27; Pro 20:7-8, Pro 20:10-11, Pro 20:20-21; Pro 21:4, Pro 21:13, Pro 21:16, Pro 21:21, Pro 21:23-24, Pro 21:30; Pro 22:4, Pro 22:11; Pro 24:8, Pro 24:26; Pro 26:16; Pro 27:14; Pro 28:8-9, Pro 28:17, Pro 28:24; Pro 29:1, Pro 29:5, Pro 29:12, Pro 29:14. In Pro 14:27; Pro 15:24; Pro 17:23; Pro 19:27, the second line consists of one sentence with ל and the infin.; in Pro 16:12, Pro 16:26; Pro 21:25; Pro 22:9; Pro 27:1; Pro 29:19, of one sentence with כּי; with כּי אם, Pro 18:2; Pro 23:17. The two lines, as Pro 11:31; Pro 15:11; Pro 17:7; Pro 19:7, Pro 19:10, Pro 20:27, form a conclusion a minori ad majus, or the reverse. The former or the latter clauses stand in grammatical relation in Pro 23:1-2, Pro 23:15., Pro 27:22; Pro 29:21 (cf. Pro 22:29; Pro 24:10; Pro 26:12; Pro 29:20, with hypoth. perf., and Pro 26:26 with hypoth. fut.); in the logical relation of reason and consequence, Pro 17:14; Pro 20:2, Pro 20:4; in comparative relation, Pro 12:9, etc. These examples show that the two lines, not merely in the more recent, but also in the old Solomonic Mashal, do not always consist of two parallel members.)\n\nBut there is also a fifth form, which corresponds most to the original character of the Mashal: the proverb explaining its ethical object by a resemblance from the region of the natural and every-day life, the παραβολή proper. The form of this parabolic proverb is very manifold, according as the poet himself expressly compares the two subjects, or only places them near each other in order that the hearer or reader may complete the comparison. The proverb is least poetic when the likeness between the two subjects is expressed by a verb; as Pro 27:15 (to which, however, Pro 27:16 belongs):\n\nA continual dropping in a rainy day\n\nAnd a contentious woman are alike.\n\nThe usual form of expression, neither unpoetic nor properly poetic, is the introduction of the comparison by כּ [as], and of the similitude in the second clause by כּן [so]; as Pro 10:26 :\n\nAs vinegar to the teeth, and as smoke to the eyes,\n\nSo is the sluggard to them who give him a commission.\n\nThis complete verbal statement of the relation of likeness may also be abbreviated by the omission of the כּן; as Pro 25:13; Pro 26:11 :\n\nAs a dog returning to his vomit -\n\nA fool returning to his folly.\n\nWe call the parabolic proverbs of these three forms comparisons. The last, the abbreviated form of the comparative proverb, which we will call, in contradistinction to the comparative, the emblematic, in which the contrast and its emblem are loosely placed together without any nearer expression of the similitude; as e.g., Pro 26:20; Pro 27:17-18, Pro 27:20. This takes place either by means of the couplative Vav, ו, as Pro 25:25 -\n\nCold water to a thirsty soul,\n\nAnd good news from a far country.\n\n(Note: This so-called Vav adaequationis, which appears here for the first time in the Proverbs as the connection between the figure and the thing itself without a verbal predicate (cf. on the other hand, Job 5:7; Job 12:11; Job 14:11.), is, like the Vav, ו, of comparison, only a species of that Vav of association which is called in Arab. Waw alajam'a, or Waw alam'ayat, or Waw al'asatsahab (vid., at Isa 42:5); and since usage attributes to it the verbal power of secum habere, it is construed with the accus. Vid., examples in Freytag's Arabum Proverbia, among the recent proverbs beginning with the Arabic letter k.)\n\nOr without the Vav; in which case the second line is as the subscription under the figure or double figure painted in the first; e.g., Pro 25:11., Pro 11:22 :\n\nA gold ring in a swine's snout -\n\nA fair woman without understanding.\n\nThese ground-forms of two lines, can, however, expand into forms of several lines. Since the distich is the peculiar and most appropriate form of the technical proverb, so, when two lines are not sufficient for expressing the thought intended, the multiplication to four, six, or eight lines is most natural. In the tetrastich the relation of the last two to the first two is as manifold as is the relation of the second line to the first in the distich. There is, however, no suitable example of four-lined stanzas in antithetic relation. But we meet with synonymous tetrastichs, e.g., Pro 23:15., Pro 24:3., 28f.; synthetic, Pro 30:5.; integral, Pro 30:17., especially of the form in which the last two lines constitute a proof passage beginning with כּי, Pro 22:22., or פּן, Pro 22:24., or without exponents, Pro 22:26.; comparative without expressing the comparison, Pro 25:16. (cf. on the other hand, Pro 26:18., where the number of lines is questionable), and also the emblematical, Pro 25:4.:\n\nTake away the dross from the silver,\n\nAnd there shall come forth a vessel for the goldsmith;\n\nTake away the wicked from before the king,\n\nAnd this throne shall be established in righteousness.\n\nProportionally the most frequently occurring are tetrastichs, the second half of which forms a proof clause commencing with כּי or פּן. Among the less frequent are the six-lined, presenting (Pro 23:1-3; Pro 24:11.) one and the same thought in manifold aspects, with proofs interspersed. Among all the rest which are found in the collection, Pro 23:12-14, Pro 23:19-21, Pro 23:26-28; Pro 30:15., Pro 30:29-31, the first two lines form a prologue introductory to the substance of the proverb; as e.g., Pro 23:12-14 :\n\nO let instruction enter into thine heart,\n\nAnd apply thine ears to the words of knowledge.\n\nWithhold not correction from the child;\n\nFor if thou beatest him with the rod - he dies not.\n\nThou shalt beat him with the rod,\n\nAnd deliver his soul from hell.\n\nSimilarly formed, yet more expanded, is the eight-lined stanza, Pro 23:22-28 :\n\nHearken unto thy father that begat thee,\n\nAnd despise not thy mother when she is old.\n\nBuy the truth and sell it not:\n\nWisdom, and virtue, and understanding.\n\nThe father of a righteous man greatly rejoices,\n\nAnd he that begetteth a wise child hath joy of him.\n\nThy father and thy mother shall be glad,\n\nAnd she that bare thee shall rejoice.\n\nThe Mashal proverb here inclines to the Mashal ode; for this octastich may be regarded as a short Mashal song, - like the alphabetical Mashal Psalm 37, which consists of almost pure tetrastichs.\n\nWe have now seen how the distich form multiplies itself into forms consisting of four, six, and eight lines; but it also unfolds itself, as if in one-sided multiplication, into forms of three, five, and seven lines. Tristichs arise when the thought of the first line is repeated (Pro 27:22) in the second according to the synonymous scheme, or when the thought of the second line is expressed by contrast in the third (Pro 22:29; Pro 28:10) according to the antithetic scheme, or when to the thought expressed in one or two lines (Pro 25:8; Pro 27:10) there is added its proof. The parabolic scheme is here represented when the object described is unfolded in two lines, as in the comparison Pro 25:13, or when its nature is portrayed by two figures in two lines, as in the emblematic proverb Pro 25:20 :\n\nTo take off clothing in cold weather,\n\nVinegar upon nitre,\n\nAnd he that singeth songs to a heavy heart.\n\nIn the few instances of pentastichs which are found, the last three lines usually unfold the reason of the thought of the first two: Pro 23:4., Pro 25:6., Pro 30:32.; to this Pro 24:13 forms an exception, where the כּן before the last three lines introduces the expansion of the figure in the first two. As an instance we quote Pro 25:6.:\n\nSeek not to display thyself in the presence of the king,\n\nAnd stand not in the place of the great.\n\nFor better that it be said unto thee, \"Come up hither,\"\n\nThan that they humble thee in the presence of the prince,\n\nWhile thine eyes have raised themselves.\n\nOf heptastichs I know of only one example in the collection, viz., Pro 23:6-8 :\n\nEat not the bread of the jealous,\n\nAnd lust not after his dainties;\n\nFor he is like one who calculates with himself: -\n\n\"Eat and drink,\" saith he to thee,\n\nAnd his heart is not with thee.\n\nThy morsel which thou hast eaten must thou vomit up,\n\nAnd thou hast wasted thy pleasant words.\n\nFrom this heptastich, which one will scarcely take for a brief Mashal ode according to the compound strophe-scheme, we see that the proverb of two lines can expand itself to the dimensions of seven and eight lines. Beyond these limits the whole proverb ceases to be משׁל in the proper sense; and after the manner of Ps 25; 34, and especially chap. 37, it becomes a Mashal ode. Of this class of Mashal odes are, besides the prologue, Pro 22:17-21, that of the drunkard, Pro 23:29-35; that of the slothful man, Pro 24:30-34; the exhortation to industry, Pro 27:23-27; the prayer for a moderate portion between poverty and riches, Pro 30:7-9; the mirror for princes, Pro 31:2-9; and the praise of the excellent wife, Pro 31:10. It is singular that this ode furnishes the only example of the alphabetical acrostic in the whole collection. Even a single trace of original alphabetical sequence afterwards broken up cannot be found. There cannot also be discovered, in the Mashal songs referred to, anything like a completed strophe-scheme; even in Pro 31:10. the distichs are broken by tristichs intermingled with them.\n\nIn the whole of the first part, Prov 1:7-9:18, the prevailing form is that of the extended flow of the Mashal song; but one in vain seeks for strophes. There is not here so firm a grouping of the lines; on the supposition of its belonging to the Solomonic era, this is indeed to be expected. The rhetorical form here outweighs the purely poetical. This first part of the Proverbs consists of the following fifteen Mashal strains: (1) Pro 1:7-19, (2) Pro 1:20., (3) chap. 2, (4) 3:1-18, (5) Pro 3:19-26, (6) Pro 3:27., (7) 4:1-5:6, (8) Pro 4:7., (9) Pro 6:1-5, (10) Pro 6:6-11, (11) Pro 6:12-19, (12) Pro 6:20., (13) chap. 7, (14) chap. 8, (15) chap. 9. In chap. 3 and chap. 9 there are found a few Mashal odes of two lines and of four lines which may be regarded as independent Mashals, and may adapt themselves to the schemes employed; other brief complete parts are only waves in the flow of the larger discourses, or are altogether formless, or more than octastichs. The octastich Pro 6:16-19 makes the proportionally greatest impression of an independent inwoven Mashal. It is the only proverb in which symbolical numbers are used which occurs in the collection from 1 to 29:\n\nThere are six things which Jahve hateth,\n\nAnd seven are an abhorrence to His soul:\n\nHaughty eyes, a lying tongue,\n\nAnd hands that shed innocent blood;\n\nAn heart that deviseth the thoughts of evil,\n\nFeet that hastily run to wickedness,\n\nOne that uttereth lies as a false witness,\n\nAnd he who soweth strife between brethren.\n\nSuch numerical proverbs to which the name מדּה has been given by later Jewish writers (see my Gesch. der Jd. Poesie, pp. 199, 202) are found in chap. 30. With the exception of Pro 30:7-9, Pro 30:24-28 (cf. Sir. 25:1, 2), the numerical proverb has this peculiarity, found also in most of the numerical proverbs of Sirach (Sir. 23:16; 25:7; 26:5, 28), that the number named in the first parallel line is in the second (cf. Job 5:9) increased by one. On the other hand, the form of the Priamel\n\n(Note: From praeambulum, designating a peculiar kind of epigram found in the German poetry of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.)\n\nis used neither in the Book of Proverbs nor in that of Sirach. Proverbs such as Pro 20:10 (\"Diverse weights, diverse measures - an abomination to Jahve are they both\") and Pro 20:12 (\"The hearing ear, the seeing eye - Jahve hath created them both\"), to be distinguished from Pro 17:3; Pro 27:21, and the like, where the necessary unity, and from Pro 27:3, where the necessary resemblance, of the predicate is wanting, are only a weak approach to the Priamel - a stronger, Pro 25:3, where the three subjects form the preamble (\"The heaven for height, and the earth for depth, and the heart of kings - are unsearchable\"). Perhaps Pro 30:11-14 is a greater mutilated Priamel. Here four subjects form the preamble, but there is wanting the conclusion containing the common predicate. This, we believe, exhausts the forms of the Mashal in the collection. It now only remains to make mention of the Mashal chain, i.e., the ranging together in a series of proverbs of a similar character, such as the chain of proverbs regarding the fool, Pro 26:1-12, the sluggard, Pro 26:13-16, the tale-bearer, Pro 26:20-22, the malicious, Pro 26:23-28 - but this form belongs more to the technics of the Mashal collection than to that of the Mashal poetry.\n\nWe now turn to the separate parts of the book, to examine more closely the forms of their proverbs, and gather materials for a critical judgment regarding the origin of the proverbs which they contain. Not to anticipate, we take up in order the separate parts of the arrangement of the collection. Since, then, it cannot be denied that in the introductory paedagogic part, Pro 1:7-9, notwithstanding its rich and deep contents, there is exceedingly little of the technical form of the Mashal, as well as generally of technical form at all. This part, as already shown, consist not of proper Mashals, but of fifteen Mashal odes, or rather, perhaps, Mashal discourses, didactic poems of the Mashal kind. In the flow of these discourses separate Mashals intermingle, which may either be regarded as independent, or, as Pro 1:32; Pro 4:18., can easily be so understood. In the Mashal chains of chap. 4 and chap. 9 we meet with proverbs that are synonymous (Pro 9:7, Pro 9:10), antithetic (Pro 3:35; Pro 9:8), integral, or of one thought (Pro 3:29-30), and synthetic (Pro 1:7; Pro 3:5, Pro 3:7), of two lines and of four lines variously disposed (Pro 3:9., 11f., 31f., 33f.); but the parabolic scheme is not at all met with, separate proverbs such as Pro 3:27. are altogether without form, and keeping out of view the octastich numerical proverb, Pro 6:16-19, the thoughts which form the unity of separate groups are so widely expanded that the measure of the Mashal proper is far exceeded. The character of this whole part is not concentrating, but unfolding. Even the intermingling proverbs of two lines possess the same character. They are for the most part more like dissolved drops than gold coins with sharp outline an","order":20,"numberOfChapters":31,"sha256":"20e0bd64619dae6740a04b7a7d7b33f0f6666efc36cef9c3e29bae3b6bcbce14","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/PRO/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"PRO","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":31,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/PRO/31.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"PRO","chapter":31},"totalNumberOfVerses":633},"chapter":{"number":10,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":1,"content":["In the introduction, chap. 1-9, there are larger sections of interconnected thoughts having one common aim. Even in Prov 6:1-19 there are manifestly three proverbial discourses distinguished from one another, shorter indeed, yet containing one fundamental thought. Such proverbs as are primarily designed to form one completed little whole of themselves, are not here to be met with. On the contrary, the Solomonic collection which now follows consists of pure distichs, for the most part antithetical, but at the same time going over all the forms of the technical proverb, as we have already shown; vid., p. 16. Accordingly the exposition must from this point onward renounce reproduced combinations of thought. The succession of proverbs here is nevertheless not one that is purely accidental or without thought; it is more than a happy accident when three of the same character stand together; the collector has connected together proverb with proverb according to certain common characteristics (Bertheau). And yet more than that: the mass separates itself into groups, not merely succeeding one another, but because a certain connection of ideas connects together a number of proverbs, in such a way that the succession is broken, and a new point of departure is arrived at (Hitzig). There is no comprehensive plan, such as Oetinger in his summary view of its contents supposes; the progressive unfolding follows no systematic scheme, but continuously wells forth. But that the editor, whom we take also to be the arranger of the contents of the book, did not throw them together by good chance, but in placing them together was guided by certain reasons, the very first proverb here shows, for it is chosen in conformity with the design of this book, which is specially dedicated to youth:\n1 A wise son maketh glad his father;\nA foolish son is his mother's grief.\nOne sees here quite distinctly (cf. Hos 13:13) that חכם (from חכם, properly to be thick, stout, solid, as πυκνός = σοφός) is primarily a practical and ethical conception. Similar proverbs are found further on, but consisting of synonymous parallel members, in which either the father both times represents the parents, as Pro 17:21; Pro 23:24, or father and mother are separated, each being named in different members, as Pro 17:25; Pro 23:25, and particularly Pro 15:20, where 20a = 1a of the above proverb. It is incorrect to say, with Hitzig, that this contrast draws the division after it: the division lies nearer in the synonymous distichs, and is there less liable to be misunderstood than in the antithetic. Thus, from this proverb before us, it might be concluded that grief on account of a befooled son going astray in bypaths, and not coming to the right way, falls principally on the mother, as (Sir. 3:9) is often the case in unfortunate marriages. The idea of the parents is in this way only separated, and the two members stand in suppletive interchangeable relationship. ישׂמּח is the middle of the clause, and is the usual form in connection; ישׂמּח is the pausal form. תּוּגה, from הוגה (יגה), has pass. , as תּורה, act. . \"The expression of the pred. 1b is like Pro 3:17; Pro 8:6; Pro 10:14.; cf. e.g., Arab. âlastaḳṣa furkat, oversharpening is dividing, i.e., effects it inquiries become or lead to separation (cf. our proverb, Allzuscharf macht scharig = too much sharpening makes full of notches); Burckhardt, Sprchw. Nr. 337\" (Fl.). \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":2,"content":["There follows now a series of proverbs which place possessions and goods under a moral-religious point of view:\nTreasures of wickedness bring no profit;\nBut righteousness delivers from death.\nThe lxx and Aquila translate ἀνόμους (ἀσεβεῖς). הועיל (to profit) with the accus. is possible, Isa 57:12, but אוצרות one does not use by itself; it requires a genitive designating it more closely. But also דּרשּׂיעא of the Targ., παρανόμων of Symmachus, fails; for the question still remains, to whom? Rightly Syr., Jerome, Theodotion, and the Quinta: ἀσεβείας, cf. Pro 4:17; Mic 4:10; Luk 16:9, μαμωνᾶς τῆς ἀδικίας. Treasures to which wickedness cleaves profit not, viz., him who has collected them through wickedness. On the contrary, righteousness saves from death (2b = Pro 11:4, where the parallelism makes it clear that death as a judgment is meant). In Deu 24:13 it had been already said that compassionate love is \"righteousness before the Lord,\" the cardinal virtue of the righteousness of life. Faith (Hab 2:4) is its soul, and love its life. Therefore δικαιοσύνη and ἐεημοσύνη are interchangeable ideas; and it ought not to be an objection against the Apocrypha that it repeats the above proverb, ἐλεημοσύνη ἐκ θανάτου ῥύεται, Tob. 4:10; 12:9, Sir. 3:30; 29:12, for Dan 4:24 also says the very same thing, and the thought is biblical, in so far as the giving of alms is understood to be not a dead work, but (Psa 112:9) the life-activity of one who fears God, and of a mind believing in Him and resting in His word. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":3,"content":["Another proverb, the members of which stand in chiastic relation to those of the preceding:\nJahve does not suffer the soul of the righteous to hunger;\nBut the craving of the godless He disappointeth.\nThe thought is the same as Pro 13:25. There, as also at Pro 6:30, the soul is spoken of as the faculty of desire, and that after nourishment, for the lowest form of the life of the soul is the impulse to self-preservation. The parallel הוּה, in which lxx and Ar. erroneously find the meaning of חיּה, life, the Syr. Targ. the meaning of הון, possession, means the desire, without however being related to אוּה (Berth.); it is the Arab. hawan, from הוה, Arab. haway, which, from the fundamental meaning χαίνειν, hiare, to gape, yawn, signifies not only unrestrained driving along, and crashing overthrow (cf. Pro 11:6; Pro 19:13), but also the breaking forth, ferri in aliquid, whence הוּה, Arab. hawan, violent desire, in Hebr. generally (here and Psa 52:9, Mich. Pro 7:3) of desire without limits and without restraint (cf. the plur. âhawâ, arbitrary actions, caprices); the meanings deduced from this important verbal stem (of which also הוה היה, accidere, and then esse, at least after the Arabic conception of speech, is an offshoot) are given by Fleischer under Job 37:6, and after Fleischer by Eth, Schlafgemach der Phantasie, ii. p. 6f. The verb הדף signifies to push in the most manifold shades, here to push forth, repellere, as Kg2 4:27 (cf. Arab. ḥadhaf, to push off = to discharge); the fut. is invariably יהדּף, like יהגּה. God gives satisfaction to the soul of the righteous, viz., in granting blessings. The desire of the wicked He does not suffer to be accomplished; it may appear for a long time as if that which was aimed at was realized, but in the end God pushes it back, so that it remains at a distance, because contrary to Him. Instead of והות רשׁעים, some editions (Plantin 1566, Bragadin 1615) have והות בּגדים, but, in opposition to all decided testimony, only through a mistaken reference to Pro 11:6. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":4,"content":["There follow two proverbs which say how one man fails and another succeeds:\nHe becomes poor who bears a sluggish hand;\nBut the hand of the diligent maketh rich.\nThese three proverbs, Pro 19:15; Pro 12:24, Pro 12:27, are similar. From the last two it is seen that רמיּה is a subst., as also from Psa 120:2. (לשׁון רמיּה, from a crafty tongue) that it is an adject., and from Lev 14:15. (where כּף is fem.) that it may be at the same time an adject. here also. The masc. is רמי, like טרי to טריּה ot , but neither of these occur; \"the fundamental idea is that of throwing oneself down lazily, when one with unbent muscles holds himself no longer erect and stretched, Arab. taramy\" (Fl.). The translation: deceitful balances (Lwenstein after Rashi), is contrary to biblical usage, which knows nothing of כף in this Mishnic meaning. But if כף is here regarded as fem., then it cannot be the subject (Jerome, egestatem operata est manus remissa), since we read עשׂה, not עשׂה. But ראשׁ also is not suitable as the subject (lxx, Syr., Targ.), for poverty is called רישׁ, רישׁ, ראשׁ; on the contrary, רשׁ, plur. רשׁים or ראשׁים, is used adjectively. Since now the adject. רשׁ, Sa1 12:14, is also written ראשׁ, it may be translated: Poor is he who... (Bertheau); but we much rather expect the statement of that which happens to such an one, thus: Poor will he be... ראשׁ, 3 praet. = רשׁ, Psa 34:11, with the same (grammatically incorrect) full writing as קאם, Hos 10:14. In the conception of the subject, כף־רמיה, after Jer 48:10, is interpreted as the accus. of the manner (Berth.: whoever works with sluggish hand); but since עשׂה רמיה (in another sense indeed: to practise cunning) is a common phrase, Psa 52:4; Psa 101:7, so also will כף־רמיה be regarded as the object: qui agit manum remissam, whoever carries or moves such a hand (Hitzig). In 4b working is placed opposite to bearing: the diligent hand makes rich, ditat or divitias parit; but not for itself (Gesen. and others: becomes rich), but for him who bears it. The diligent man is called חרוּץ, from חרץ, to sharpen, for, as in ὀξύς, acer, sharpness is transferred to energy; the form is the same as הלּוּק, smooth (for the ā is unchangeable, because recompensative), a kindred form to קטול like חמוץ, and Arab. fâ'ûl as fashawsh, a boaster, wind-bag, either of active (as חנּוּן) or (as חלוק, חרוץ, עמּוּד, שׁכּוּל) of passive signification. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":5,"content":["There is now added a proverb which, thus standing at the beginning of the collection, and connecting itself with Pro 10:1, stamps on it the character of a book for youth:\nHe that gathereth in summer is a wise son;\nBut he that is sunk in sleep in the time of harvest is a son that causeth shame.\nVon Hofmann (Schriftb. ii. 2. 403) rightly interprets בּן משׂכּיל and בּן מבישׁ, with Cocceius and others, as the subject, and not with Hitzig as predicate, for in nominal clauses the rule is to place the predicate before the subject; and since an accurate expression of the inverted relation would both times require הוא referring to the subject, so we here abide by the usual syntax: he that gathers in summer time is... Also the relation of the members of the sentence, Pro 19:26, is a parallel from which it is evident that the misguided son is called מבישׁ as causing shame, although in הבישׁ the idea to put to shame (= to act so that others are ashamed) and to act shamefully (disgracefully), as in השׂכיל the ideas to have insight and to act intelligently, lie into one another (cf. Pro 14:35); the root-meaning of השׂכיל is determined after שׂכל, which from שׂכל, complicare, designates the intellect as the faculty of intellectual configuration. בּושׁ, properly disturbari, proceeds from a similar conception as the Lat. confundi (pudore). קיץ and קציר fall together, for קיץ (from קוץ = qât, to be glowing hot) is just the time of the קציר; vid., under Gen 8:22. To the activity of a thoughtful ingathering, אגר, for a future store (vid., Pro 6:7), stands opposed deep sleep, i.e., the state of one sunk in idleness. נרדּם means, as Schultens has already shown, somno penitus obrui, omni sensu obstructo et oppilato quasi, from רדם, to fill, to shut up, to conclude; the derivation (which has been adopted since Gesenius) from the Arab. word having the same sound, rdm, stridere, to shrill, to rattle (but not stertere, to snore), lies remote in the Niph., and also contradicts the usage of the word, according to which it designates a state in which all free activity is bound, and all reference to the external world is interrupted; cf. תּרדּמה, Pro 19:15, of dulness, apathy, somnolency in the train of slothfulness. The lxx has here one distich more than the Hebr. text. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":6,"content":["There now follow two proverbs regarding the blessings and the curses which come to men, and which flow forth from them. Here, however, as throughout, we take each proverb by itself, that it might not appear as if we had a tetrastich before us. The first of these two antithetic distichs is:\nBlessings (come) on the head of the just;\nBut violence covereth the mouth of the godless.\nBlessings are, without being distinguished, bestowed as well as prayed for from above. Regarding the undistinguished uses of לראשׁ (of a recompense of reward), בּראשׁ (of penal recompense), and על־ראשׁ (especially of punishment), vid., under Gen 49:26. If we understand, with Ewald, Bertheau, Elster, Zckler, and others, the two lines after Pro 10:11, Pro 19:28, cf. Pro 10:18 : the mouth of the wicked covers (hides under a mask) violence, inasmuch as he speaks words of blessing while thoughts of malediction lurk behind them (Psa 62:5), then we renounce the sharpness of the contrast. On the contrary, it is preserved if we interpret וּפי as object: the violence that has gone out from it covereth the mouth of the wicked, i.e., it falls back upon his foul mouth; or as Fleischer (and Oetinger almost the same) paraphrases it: the deeds of violence that have gone forth from them are given back to them in curses and maledictions, so that going back they stop, as it were, their mouth, they bring them to silence; for it is unnecessary to take פי synecdochically for פני (cf. e.g., Psa 69:8), since in בּרכות 6a are perhaps chiefly meant blessings of thankful acknowledgment on the part of men, and the giving prominence to the mouth of the wicked from which nothing good proceeds is well accounted for. The parallels do not hinder us thus to explain, since parts of proverbs repeating themselves in the Book of Proverbs often show a change of the meaning (vid., p. 24f.). Hitzig's conjecture, יכּסה (better יכסּה), is unnecessary; for elsewhere we read, as here, that חמס (violence), jure talionis, covers, יכּסּה, the wicked, Hab 2:17, or that he, using \"violence,\" therewith covers the whole of his external appearance, i.e., gives to it the branded impress of the unrighteousness he has done (vid., Khler under Mal 2:16). \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["Thus, as Pro 10:6 says how it goes with the righteous and the wicked in this life, so this verse tells how it fares with them after death:\nThe memory of the righteous remains in blessings,\nAnd the name of the godless rots.\nThe tradition regarding the writing of זכר with five (זכר) or six points (זכר) is doubtful (vid., Heidenheim in his ed. of the Pentateuch, Mer Enajim, under Exo 17:14); the Cod. 1294 and old printed copies have here זכר. Instead of לברכה, יברך might be used; the phrase היה לברכה (opp. היה לקללה, often used by Jeremiah), subordinate to the substantival clause, paraphrases the passive, for it expresses a growing to something, and thus the entrance into a state of endurance. The remembrance of the righteous endures after his death, for he is thought of with thankfulness (צל''ז = זכר צדיק לברכה, the usual appendix to the name of an honoured, beloved man who has died), because his works, rich in blessing, continue; the name of the godless, on the contrary, far from continuing fresh and green (Psa 62:1-12 :17) after his departure, becomes corrupt (רקב, from רק, to be or to become thin, to dissolve in fine parts, tabescere), like a worm-eaten decayed tree (Isa 40:20). The Talmud explains it thus, Joma 38b: foulness comes over their name, so that we call no one after their name. Also the idea suggests itself, that his name becomes corrupt, as it were, with his bones; the Mishnah, at least Ohaloth ii. 1, uses רקב of the dust of corruption. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":8,"content":["There follows now a series of proverbs in which reference to sins of the mouth and their contrary prevails:\nHe that is wise in heart receives precepts;\nBut he that is of a foolish mouth comes to ruin.\nA חכם־לב, wise-hearted, as one whose heart is חכם, Pro 23:15; in a word, a נבון, a person of understanding or judgment, Pro 16:21. Such an one does not make his own knowledge the ne plus ultra, nor does he make his own will the noli me tangere; but he takes commands, i.e., instructions directing or prohibiting, to which he willingly subordinates himself as the outflow of a higher knowledge and will, and by which he sets bounds and limits to himself. But a fool of the lips, i.e., a braggart blunderer, one pleasing himself with vain talk (Pro 14:23), falls prostrate, for he thinks that he knows all things better, and will take no pattern; but while he boasts himself from on high, suddenly all at once - for he offends against the fundamental principle of common life and of morality - he comes to lie low down on the ground. The Syr. and Targ. translate ילּבט by, he is caught (Bertheau, ensnared); Aquila, Vulgate, Luther, δαρήσεται, he is slain; Symmachus, βασανισθήσεται; but all without any support in the usage of the language known to us. Theodotion, φυρήσεται, he is confounded, is not tenable; Joseph Kimchi, who after David Kimchi, under Hos 4:14, appeals in support of this meaning (ישׁתבשׁ, similarly Parchon: יתבלבל) to the Arabic, seems to think on iltibâs, confusion. The demonstrable meanings of the verb לבט are the following: 1. To occasion trouble. Thus Mechilta, under Exo 17:14, לבטוהו, one has imposed upon him trouble; Sifri, under Num 11:1, נתלבטנו, we are tired, according to which Rashi: he fatigues himself, but which fits neither to the subj. nor to the contrast, which is to be supposed. The same may be said of the meaning of the Syr. lbt, to drive on, to press, which without doubt accords with the former meaning of the word in the language of the Midrash. 2. In Arab. labaṭ (R. lab, vid., Wnsche's Hos. p. 172), to throw any one down to the earth, so that he falls with his whole body his whole length; the passive נלבט, to be thus thrown down by another, or to throw oneself thus down, figuratively of one who falls hopelessly into evil and destruction (Fl.). The Arabic verb is also used of the springing run of the animal ridden on (to gallop), and of the being lame (to hop), according to which in the Lex. the explanations, he hurries, or he wavers hither and thither, are offered by Kimchi (Graec. Venet. πλανηθήσεται). But the former of these explanations, corruit (= in calamitatem ruit), placed much nearer by the Arabic, is confirmed by the lxx ὑποσκελισθήσεται, and by the Bershith rabba, c. 52, where לבט is used in the sense to be ruined (= נכשׁל). Hitzig changes the passive into the active: \"he throws the offered לקח scornfully to the ground,\" but the contrast does not require this. The wanton, arrogant boasting lies already in the designation of the subj. אויל שׂפתים; and the sequel involves, as a consequence, the contrasted consequence of ready reception of the limitations and guidance of his own will by a higher. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":9,"content":["The form of this verse is like the eighth, word for word:\nHe that walketh in innocence walketh securely;\nBut he that goeth in secret ways is known.\nThe full form of בּתּום does not, as Hitzig supposes, stand in causal connection with the Dech, for the consonant text lying before us is at least 500 years older than the accentuation. For הלך תּם at Pro 2:7, there is here הלך בּתּום = הלך בּדרך תום; so מעקּשׁ דּרכיו denotes, after Pro 2:15, such an one אשׁר דּרכיו עקּשׁים. Expressed in the language of the N.T., תום is the property of the ἁπλοῦς or ἀκέραιος, for the fundamental idea of fulness is here referred to full submission, full integrity. Such an one goes בּטח (Aquila, ἀμερίμνως), for there is nothing designedly concealed by him, of which he has reason to fear that it will come to the light; whoever, on the contrary, makes his ways crooked, i.e., turns into crooked ways, is perceived, or, as we might also explain it (vid., under Gen 4:15): if one (qui = si quis) makes his ways crooked, then it is known - nothing, however, stands opposed to the reference of יוּדע to the person: he is finally known, i.e., unmasked (lxx Jerome, γνωσθήσεται, manifestus fiet). Usually it is explained: he is knowing, clever, with the remark that נודע is here the passive of הודיע (Gesen., Ewald, Hitzig); Hiph. to give to feel; Niph. to become to feel, properly to be made to know (Luth.: made wise); but the passive of the Hiph. is the Hoph. Such a Niph. in which the causative (not simply transitive) signification of the Hiph. would be applied passively is without example (vid., Ewald, 133a); the meaning of Jer 31:19 also is: after I have become known, i.e., been made manifest, uncovered, drawn into the light. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":10,"content":["This verse contains another proverb, similarly formed, parallel with the half of Pro 10:8 :\nHe that winketh with the eye causeth trouble;\nAnd a foolish mouth comes to ruin.\nRegarding the winking or nipping, i.e., the repeated nipping of the eyes (cf. nictare, frequent. of nicere), as the conduct of the malicious or malignant, which aims at the derision or injury of him to whom it refers, vid., under Pro 6:13; there קרץ was connected with ב of the means of the action; here, as Psa 35:19, cf. Pro 16:30, it is connected with the object accus. He who so does produces trouble (heart-sorrow, Pro 15:13), whether it be that he who is the butt of this mockery marks it, or that he is the victim of secretly concerted injury; יתּן is not here used impersonally, as Pro 13:10, but as Pro 29:15, cf. Lev 19:28; Lev 24:20, in the sense of the cause. 10b forms a striking contrast to 10a, according to the text of the lxx: ὁ δὲ ἐλεγχων μετὰ παῤῥησίας εἰρηνοποιεῖ, contrary to the Syr., by the Hebrew text, which certainly is older than this its correction, which Ewald and Lagarde unsuccessfully attempt to translate into the Hebrew. The foolish mouth, here understood in conformity with 10a, is one who talks at random, without examination and deliberation, and thus suddenly stumbles and falls over, so that he comes to lie on the ground, to his own disgrace and injury. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":11,"content":["Another proverb, similar to the half of Pro 10:6 :\nA fountain of life is the mouth of the righteous;\nBut the mouth of the godless hideth violence.\nIf we understand 11b wholly as 6b: os improborum obteget violentia, then the meaning of 11a would be, that that which the righteous speaks tends to his own welfare (Fl.). But since the words spoken are the means of communication and of intercourse, one has to think of the water as welling up in one, and flowing forth to another; and the meaning of 11b has to accommodate itself to the preceding half proverb, whereby it cannot be mistaken that חמס (violence), which was 6b subj., bears here, by the contrast, the stamp of the obj.; for the possibility of manifold windings and turnings is a characteristic of the Mashal. In the Psalms and Prophets it is God who is called מקור חיּים, Psa 36:10; Jer 2:13; Jer 17:13; the proverbial poetry plants the figure on ethical ground, and understands by it a living power, from which wholesome effects accrue to its possessor, Pro 14:27, and go forth from him to others, Pro 13:14. Thus the mouth of the righteous is here called a fountain of life, because that which he speaks, and as he speaks it, is morally strengthening, intellectually elevating, and inwardly quickening in its effect on the hearers; while, on the contrary, the mouth of the godless covereth wrong (violentiam), i.e., conceals with deceitful words the intention, directed not to that which is best, but to the disadvantage and ruin of his neighbours; so that words which in the one case bring to light a ground of life and of love, and make it effectual, in the other case serve for a covering to an immoral, malevolent background. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":12,"content":["Another proverb of the different effects of hatred and of love:\nHate stirreth up strife,\nAnd love covereth all transgressions.\nRegarding מדנים, for which the Kerı̂ elsewhere substitutes מדינים, vid., under Pro 6:14. Hatred of one's neighbour, which is of itself an evil, has further this bad effect, that it calls forth hatred, and thus stirreth up strife, feuds, factions, for it incites man against man (cf. ערר, Job 3:8); on the contrary, love covers not merely little errors, but also greater sins of every kind (כּל־פּשׁעים), viz., by pardoning them, concealing them, excusing them, if possible, with mitigating circumstances, or restraining them before they are executed. All this lies in the covering. James, however, gives it, Jam 5:20, another rendering: love covers them, viz., from the eyes of a holy God; for it forgives them to the erring brother, and turns him from the error of his way. The lxx improperly translate πάντας δὲ τοὺς μὴ φιλονεικοῦντας κελόπτει φιλία; but Peter (Pe1 4:8) as well as James, but none of the Greek versions; ἡ ἀγάπη καλύψει πλῆθος ἁμαρτιῶν. The Romish Church makes use of this passage as a proof for the introduction of the fides formata, viz., caritate, in justification, which is condemned in the Apology of the Augsburg Confession; and, indeed, the multitudo peccatorum is not meant of the sins of him who cherishes love, but of the sins of the neighbour. Sin stirs up hatred in men in their relation to one another; but love covers the already existing sins, and smooths the disturbances occasioned by them. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":13,"content":["There follow now two other proverbs on the use and abuse of speech:\nOn the lips of the man of understanding wisdom is found;\nAnd the rod for the back of the fool.\nWith Lwenstein, Hitzig, and others, it is inadmissible to regard ושׁבט as a second subject to תּמּצא. The mouth itself, or the word of the mouth, may be called a rod, viz., a rod of correction (Isa 11:4); but that wisdom and such a rod are found on the lips of the wise would be a combination and a figure in bad taste. Thus 13b is a clause by itself, as Luther renders it: \"but a rod belongs to the fool's back;\" and this will express a contrast to 13a, that while wisdom is to be sought for on the lips of the man of understanding (cf. Mal 2:7), a man devoid of understanding, on the contrary, gives himself to such hollow and corrupt talk, that in order to educate him to something better, if possible, the rod must be applied to his back; for, according to the Talmudic proverb: that which a wise man gains by a hint, a fool only obtains by a club. The rod is called שׁבט, from שׁבט, to be smooth, to go straight down (as the hair of the head); and the back גּו, from גּוה, to be rounded, i.e., concave or convex. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":14,"content":["14 Wise men store up knowledge;\nBut the mouth of the fool is threatening destruction.\nEwald, Bertheau, Hitzig, Oetinger: \"The mouth of the fool blunders out, and is as the sudden falling in of a house which one cannot escape from.\" But since מחתּה is a favourite Mishle-word to denote the effect and issue of that which is dangerous and destructive, so the sense is perhaps further to be extended: the mouth of the fool is for himself (Pro 13:3) and others a near, i.e., an always threatening and unexpectedly occurring calamity; unexpectedly, because suddenly he blunders out with his inconsiderate shame-bringing talk, so that such a fool's mouth is to every one a praesens periculum. As to יצפּנוּ, it is worthy of remark that in the Beduin, Arab. dfn, fut. i, signifies to be still, to be thoughtful, to be absorbed in oneself (vid., Wetstein on Job, p. 281). According to Codd. and editions, in this correct, וּפי־ is to be written instead of אויל uwpiy; vid., Baer's Torath Emeth, p. 40. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":15,"content":["A pair of proverbs regarding possession and gain.\nRegarding possession:\nThe rich man's wealth is his strong city;\nThe destruction of the poor is their poverty.\nThe first line = Pro 18:11. One may render the idea according to that which is internal, and according to that which is external; and the proverb remains in both cases true. As עז may mean, of itself alone, power, as means of protection, or a bulwark (Psa 8:3), or the consciousness of power, high feeling, pride (Jdg 5:21); so קרית עזּו may be rendered as an object of self-confidence, and מחתּה, on the contrary, as an object of terror (Jer 48:39): the rich man, to whom his estate (vid., on הון, p. 63) affords a sure reserve and an abundant source of help, can appear confident and go forth energetically; on the contrary, the poor man is timid and bashful, and is easily dejected and discouraged. Thus e.g., Oetinger and Hitzig. But the objective interpretation is allowable, and lies also much nearer: the rich man stands thus independent, changes and adversities cannot so easily overthrow him, he is also raised above many hazards and temptations; on the contrary, the poor man is overthrown by little misfortunes, and his despairing endeavours to save himself, when they fail, ruin him completely, and perhaps make him at the same time a moral outlaw. It is quite an experienced fact which this proverb expresses, but one from which the double doctrine is easily derived: (1) That it is not only advised, but also commanded, that man make the firm establishing of his external life-position the aim of his endeavour; (2) That one ought to treat with forbearance the humble man; and if he always sinks deeper and deeper, one ought not to judge him with unmerciful harshness and in proud self-exaltation. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":16,"content":["Regarding gain:\nThe gain of the righteous tendeth to life;\nThe income of the godless to sin.\nIntentionally, that which the righteous received is called פּעלּה (as Lev 19:13), as a reward of his labour; that which the godless receives is called תּבוּאה, as income which does not need to be the reward of labour, and especially of his own immediate labour. And with לחיּים, לחטּאת runs parallel, from the supposition that sin carries the germ of death in itself. The reward of his labour serves to the righteous to establish his life, i.e., to make sure his life-position, and to elevate his life-happiness. On the contrary, the income of the godless serves only to ruin his life; for, made thereby full and confident, he adds sin to sin, whose wages is death. Hitzig translates: for expiation, i.e., to lose it again as atonement for past sins; but if חיים and חטאת are contrasted with each other, then חטאת is death-bringing sin (Pro 8:35.). \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":17,"content":["The group of proverbs now following bring again to view the good and bad effects of human speech. The seventeenth verse introduces the transition:\n17 There is a way to life when one gives heed to correction;\nAnd whoever disregards instruction runs into error.\nInstead of ארח חיּים (Pro 5:6), there is here ארח לחיים; and then this proverb falls into rank with Pro 10:16, which contains the same word לחיים. The accentuation denotes ארח as subst.; for ארח way, road = ארח [a wayfarer, part. of ארח] would, as שׁסע, Lev 11:7, נטע, Psa 94:9, have the tone on the ultima. It is necessary neither to change the tone, nor, with Ewald, to interpret ארח as abstr. pro concreto, like הלך, for the expression \"wanderer to life\" has no support in the Mishle. Michaelis has given the right interpretation: via ad vitam est si quis custodiat disciplinam. The syntactical contents, however, are different, as e.g., Sa1 2:13, where the participle has the force of a hypothetical clause; for the expression: \"a way to life is he who observes correction,\" is equivalent to: he is on the way to life who...; a variety of the manner of expression: \"the porch was twenty cubits,\" Ch2 3:4, particularly adapted to the figurative language of proverbial poetry, as if the poet said: See there one observant of correction - that (viz., the שׁמר [שׁמר, to watch] representing itself in this שׁמר) is the way to life. מוּסר and תּוכחת are related to each other as παιδεία and ἔλεγχος; עזב [עזב, to leave, forsake] is equivalent to בּלתּי שׁמר. מתעה would be unsuitable as a contrast in the causative sense: who guides wrong, according to which Bertheau understands 17a, that only he who observes correction can guide others to life. We expect to hear what injuries he who thinks to raise himself above all reproach brings on himself. Hitzig, in his Commentary (1858), for this reason places the Hithpa. מתּעה (rather write מתּעה) in the place of the Hiph.; but in the Comm. on Jeremiah (1866), 42:20, he rightly remarks: \"To err, not as an involuntary condition, but as an arbitrary proceeding, is suitably expressed by the Hiph.\" In like manner הוסיף, הגּיע (to touch), הרחיק (to go to a distance), denote the active conduct of a being endowed with reason; Ewald, 122, c. Jewish interpreters gloss מתעה by supplying נפשׁו; but it signifies only as inwardly transitive, to accomplish the action of the תּעות. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":18,"content":["18 He that hideth hatred is a mouth of falsehood;\nAnd he that spreadeth slander is a fool.\nThe lxx, καλύπτουσιν ἔχθραν χεῖλα δίκαια, which Ewald prefers, and which has given occasion to Hitzig to make a remarkable conjecture (\"He who conceals hatred, close lips,\" which no one understands without Hitzig's comment. to this his conjecture). But (1) to hide hatred (cf. Pro 10:11, Pro 26:24) is something altogether different from to cover sin (Pro 10:12, Pro 17:9), or generally to keep anything secret with discretion (Pro 10:13); and (2) that δίκαια is a corrupt reading for ἄδικα (as Grabe supposes, and Symmachus translates) or δόλια (as Lagarde supposes, and indeed is found in Codd.). Michaelis well remarks: odium tectum est dolosi, manifesta sycophantia stultorum. Whoever conceals hateful feelings behind his words is שׂפתי־שׂקר, a mouth of falsehood (cf. the mouth of the fool, Pro 10:14); one does not need to supply אישׁ, but much rather has hence to conclude that a false man is simply so named, as is proved by Psa 120:3. There is a second moral judgment, 18b: he who spreadeth slander (וּמוצא, according to the Masoretic writing: he who divulges it, the correlate to הביא, to bring to, Gen 37:2) is a Thor fool, stupid, dull, כּסיל (not a Narr fool, godless person, אויל); for such slandering can generally bring no advantage; it injures the reputation of him to whom the דבּה, i.e., the secret report, the slander, refers; it sows discord, has incalculable consequences, and finally brings guilt on the tale-bearer himself. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":19,"content":["19 In a multitude of words transgression is not wanting;\nBut he who restrains his lips shows wisdom.\nWe do not, with Bertheau, understand 19a: by many words a transgression does not cease to be what it is; the contrast 19b requires a more general condemnation of the multitude of words, and חדל not only means to cease from doing (to leave off), and to cease from being (to take away), but also not at all to do (to intermit, Eze 3:11; Zac 11:12), and not at all to be (to fail, to be absent), thus: ubi verborum est abundantia non deest peccatum (Fl.). Michaelis suitably compares πολυλογία πολλὰ σφάλματα ἒχει by Stobus, and כל המרבה דברים מביא חטא in the tractate Aboth i. 17, wherewith Rashi explains the proverb. פּשׁע is not here, as elsewhere, e.g., Psa 19:14, with special reference to the sin of falling away from favour, apostasy, but, like the post-biblical עברה, generally with reference to every kind of violation (פשׁע = Arab. fsq dirumpere) of moral restraint; here, as Jansen remarks, peccatum sive mendacii, sive detractionis, sive alterius indiscretae laesionis, sive vanitatis, sive denique verbi otiosi. In 19b it is more appropriate to regard משׂכּיל as the present of the internal transitive (intelligenter agit) than to interpret it in the attributive sense (intelligens). \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":20,"content":["20 Choice silver is the tongue of the righteous;\nBut the heart of the godless is little worth.\nChoice silver is, as Pro 8:19, cf. 10, pure, freed from all base mixtures. Like it, pure and noble, is whatever the righteous speaks; the heart, i.e., the manner of thought and feeling, of the godless is, on the contrary, like little instar nihili, i.e., of little or no worth, Arab. yasway kâlyla (Fl.). lxx: the heart of the godless ἐκλείψει, i.e., ימעט, at first arrogant and full of lofty plans, it becomes always the more dejected, discouraged, empty. But 20a leads us to expect some designation of its worth. The Targ. (according to which the Peshito is to be corrected; vid., Levy's Wrterbuch, ii. 26): the heart of the godless is מחתא (from נחת), refuse, dross. The other Greek versions accord with the text before us. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":21,"content":["21 The lips of the righteous edify many;\nBut fools die through want of understanding.\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":22,"content":["21 The lips of the righteous edify many;\nBut fools die through want of understanding.\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":23,"content":["21 The lips of the righteous edify many;\nBut fools die through want of understanding.\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":24,"content":["21 The lips of the righteous edify many;\nBut fools die through want of understanding.\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":25,"content":["21 The lips of the righteous edify many;\nBut fools die through want of understanding.\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":26,"content":["21 The lips of the righteous edify many;\nBut fools die through want of understanding.\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":27,"content":["21 The lips of the righteous edify many;\nBut fools die through want of understanding.\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":28,"content":["21 The lips of the righteous edify many;\nBut fools die through want of understanding.\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":29,"content":["21 The lips of the righteous edify many;\nBut fools die through want of understanding.\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":30,"content":["21 The lips of the righteous edify many;\nBut fools die through want of understanding.\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":31,"content":["21 The lips of the righteous edify many;\nBut fools die through want of understanding.\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":32,"content":["21 The lips of the righteous edify many;\nBut fools die through want of understanding.\n"]}]},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/PRO/10.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"PRO","chapter":10},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/PRO/11.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"PRO","chapter":11},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/PRO/9.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"PRO","chapter":9},"numberOfVerses":32}