The Pulpit Commentary — Proverbs — Section 412

day the warning was given. So in Heb. iii. the oerta.inty of the words of truth. The 7, 13 we read, "As the Holy Ghost saitb, object intended is to teach the disoiple the To-day if ye will hear his voice, harden not fixed rule (.fi,-mitatem, Vulgate) by which your hearts. . . . Exhort one another daily, truthful words are guided (see Luke i. 4). so long as it is cnlled To-day, lest any of Septuagint, "I therefore teach thee a true you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin," word and knowledge good to learn." That 8eptuagint, "That thy hope may be in the thou mighteat answer the words of truth' to Lord, and he may make thy way known unto them that send nnto thee, 'l'his implies thee." Cheyne(' Job and Solomon') qnotes thnt the pupil will be enabled to teaoh Bickell's correction of this '\"erse, " That others who apply to him for instruction; thy confidence may be in Jehovah, to make "wi)l be ready," ns St. Peter says, "always kno'll"Il unto thee thy ways; " but the altera- to give an answer to every man that asketh tion seems arbitrary and unnecessary. you a r~~son of the hope that is in you" Yer. 20.-Have not I written to thee ex- (1 Pet. m. 15). But the last expression is oellent things ill counsels and knowledge 1 better trnnslated, "them that send thee·" There is a difficulty about the word ren- illis qui miserunt te, Vulgate (see eh. rl.v. dered "excellent things." The Khetib has 13); and we must conceive of these as being "1::-':-::', "the day before yesterday, formerly;" parents or tutors who send a youth to· e. but the word occurs nowhere alone, and, ns school or wise man to be educated, The Nowack says, can hardly have been the moralist expre~ses his desire that the dis- original reading. However, Ewald, Ber- ciple will carry home such wholesome, truth- theau, and others, adopting it, suppose that ful doctrines as will prove th.nt the pains the author refers to some earlier work. expended upon him have not been useless. ChPyne cites Bickell's rendering, "Now, Septuagint, ,, That thou mayest answer \"ears before now, have I written nnto thee words of truth to those who put questions to iong before with counsels and knowledge," thee (-rois 1rpo{Ja}\}l.oµ.lvo,s uo,)." The Syriac and considers the words to mean either that adds, "That I may make known unto thee. the compiler took a long time over his work, counsel e.nd wi~dom." Bickell's • version or that this was not the first occasion of his (quoted by Cheyue) is; "That thou mayest writing. One does not see why stress should know the rightness of these words, that be here laid on former instruction, unless, thou mavest answer in true words to them perhaps, as Plnmptre suggests, in contrast that ask thee." to " this day" of the previous ,erse. The Ver. 22-ch. xxiv. 22.-,--Here commence LXX. renders the word -rp,crcrriis tl:ius, "And do thou record them for thyself triply for the " words of the wise." counsel and knowledge upon the table of Ver.22.-This nnd thefollowingverseform thine heart." St. J erume has, J,,cce descripsi o. telro.stich, which connects itself in thought eam ti"bi tripliciter, in cogitationibUB et with ver. 16. Rob not the poor, because he seientiis. Other '\"ersions have also given a is poor. The word for "poor" is here daT, numerical explanation to the term. In it is which means "feeble," "powerless" (see on setan an allusion to the three supposed works eh. xix. 4), and the writer enjoins the d's- of Solomon-Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Canticles ciple not t~ be induced by his weakness to -which is alisnrd; others refer it to the injure and despoil a poor man. Neither threefold division of the Testament-Law, oppress the e.fflicted in the gate. The gate Prophets, and Hagiographa; others, to three is the place of judgment, the court of justice classes of youths for whom the admonitions (comp. Job xxxi. 21). The warning points were intended ; others, again, think it equi- to the particular form of wrong inflicted on valent to "oftentimes," or "in many forms." the lowly by unjust judges, who could give But the reading is as doubtful as the ex- seutences from which, however ,iniquitous, planations of it are unsatisfactory. 'l'hc there wn~ prnclirally no appenl. genuine word is doubtless preserved in the Ver. 23.-Ftr, tlwugh they nre powerless Keri, which gives □'1?7~ (shalishim), pro- to defend the111sel\·es, and have no earthly perly a military temi, applied to chariot- patrons, the Lord will plead their cause ( eh. fighters and men of rank in_ the army. 'l'he xxiii. 11). Jehovah will bo their Advocnte LXX. translates the word oy -rpi<1-rcf.-r1}s e.g. and Protector. And spoil the soul of those Exod. xiv. 7; xv. 4), which is equivalent to that spoiled them; rather, despoil of life those •· chieftain." Hence the Hebrew term, under- that despoil them. So the Revised Version. stood in the neuter gendel', is transferred to God, exercising his moral government on the chief among proverbs-" choice proverbR," humnn concerns, will bring ruin and death as Delitzsch calls them. The Venetian, by on the unjust judge or tho rich oppressor of a hapi,y turn, gi veR -rp,crµ.l-y,u-ra. Thus we the poor. Jerome has, Cmfiget toB qui con- con,e back to the rendering of the Authorized fizerunt animam ejus, The verb used is Version e.s most co1Tect and intelligible. 11:ip (kabah), which is found only here and Ver. 21.-That I might make thee know Mal. iii. 8, where it means ''to defrnud" or OH. XXII, 1-29.] THE PROVERBS. 427