The Pulpit Commentary — Proverbs — Section 14

2. The antithetic presents in the second member e. contrast to t,he first, bringing forward a fact or an idea which offers the other side of the picture- " The labour of the righteous tendeth to life: The increase of the wicked to sin" (eh. x. 16). "The thoughts of the righteous are judgment : But the counsels of the wicked are deceit" (eh. xii. 5). These are, perhaps, of more frequent occurrence than any. Sometimes the form is interrogative- " The spirit of a man will sustain his infirmity: But a broken spirit who can bear?" (eh. xviii. 14). 3. Synthesis in logic is an argnment advancing regularly from principles conceded to a conclusion founded thereon. The term has beei:i loosely applied to our subject, and synt'hetical proverbs are such as contain two different truths embodied in the distich, and not necessarily dependent one upon another, but connected by some feature common to both. " The fear of the wicked, it shall come upon him ; And the desire of the righteous shall be granted" (eh. x. 24). The idea of the future is here the connecting link. In tho following distich the misery which results in both cases is the point:- " He that is slack in his work Is brother to him that is a destroyer" (eh. xviii. 9). 4. This last example introduces ,us to what Delitzsch terms the integral proverb, where the second line completes the thought which is only begun in the first- "The law of the wise is a fountain of life, To depart from the snares of death" (eh. xiii. 14). " The eyes of the Lord are in every place, • Keeping watch upon the evil and the good" (eh. xv. 3), This is called also progressive, a gradation being presented from the less tq t.he greater, or the greater to the less, as- • "Behold, the righteous shall be recompensed in the earth: How much more the wicked and the sinner I" (eh. xi. 31). "Sheol and Abaddon are before the Lord: How much more thcu the hearts of the children of men I" (eh. :xv. 11), 5. The fifth sort of proverb is named the parabolic, which is, perhaps, the most striking and significant of all, and capable of manifold expYession. Herein a fact in nature or in common life is stated, and an ethical lesson grounded upon it. The comparison is sometimes introduced by particles- " As vinegar to the teeth, and as smoke to the eyes, Bo is the sluggard to them that send him" (eh. x. 26),  THE PROVERBS. xxvii -------------------------- - ---- Sometimes it is suggested by mere juxtaposition- " A jewel of gold in a. swine's snout, A fair woman which is without discretfon" (cb. xi. 22). Or it is introduced by "and," the so-called vav adcequationis- " Cold water to a. thirsty soul, And good news from a. far country" (eh. xxv. 25). "For lack of wood the fire goeth out, And where there is no whisperer, contention ceaseth" (eh. xxvi. 20). To the forms here specified must be added the numerical proverb (middah, "measure"), where a certain number is stated in the first line, which is usually increased by one in the second, and thus a. kind of climax is formed which gives force and piquancy to the sentence. Familiar examples occur in Amos i., where we find a series of propositions commencing with the words, "For three, . . . yea, for four," etc. There is only one of these in our book from eh. i. to xxix., and that is the octastich, eh. vi. 16-19, beginning- " There be six things which the Lord hateth, Yea, seven which are an abomination unto him." But there are many in eh. xxx., viz. vers. 15, 18, 21, 29. These are all in the form mentioned above, the first-named number being augmented by o~e. Two more are of simpler form, being not climacteric, viz. vers. 7-9, 24~28. The latter, e.g., says- " There are four things which are little upon the earth, But they are exceeding wise; " and then proceeds to specify the ants, conies, locusts, and lizards. The last two .chapters possess a character of their own, quite distinct from the rest of the work; eh. xxx. being for the most part destitute of parallelism, Lemuel's words forming a continuous instruction in which the second member. of each verse repeats the idea and almost the very words of the first, and the eulogium of the virtnons woman taking the shape of an acrostic ode. Of the principles which guided the editors in their arrangement of the material before them, it is impossible to give any satisfactory account. Sometimes the proverbs are loosely connected by certain catchwords which occur in a series. Thus in eh. xii. 5-7 the link is found in the recurrence of the words" righteous" (tsaddik) and ''wicked" (rasha); in eh. x. 8, 13, 20, 21, we have in the Hebrew continually the word leb, "heart; " so in eh. xii. 8, 11, 20, 23, 25, and elsewhere. Sometimes the subject supplies the connection, ,f118 in eh. xviii. 10, 11, where the fortress of faith and that of presumption ,are contrasted; oh. x.xii. 30, 31, where the overrnling of God's providence is the theme. But generally the grouping is arbitrary, and the attempt, like that of Zi:ickler, to give a. synoptical account of the contents is far from satisfactory. xxdii INTRODUCTION TO