translation_id: net-engnet

book_id: PRO

label: NET study note

text: The chapter advises release from foolish indebtedness (1-5), admonishes avoiding laziness (6-11), warns of the danger of poverty (9-11) and deviousness (12-15), lists conduct that the Lord hates (16-19), and warns about immorality (20-35).


text: It was fairly common for people to put up some kind of financial security for someone else, that is, to underwrite another’s debts. But the pledge in view here was foolish because the debtor was a neighbor who was not well known ( זָר , zar ), perhaps a misfit in the community. The one who pledged security for this one was simply gullible.


text: The sluggard ( עָצֵל , ’ atsel ) is the lazy or sluggish person (cf. NCV “lazy person”; NRSV, NLT “lazybones”).


text: The use of the two rhetorical questions is designed to rebuke the lazy person in a forceful manner. The sluggard is spending too much time sleeping.


text: The writer might in this verse be imitating the words of the sluggard who just wants to take “a little nap.” The use is ironic, for by indulging in this little rest the lazy one comes to ruin.


text: The terms describe one who is both worthless and wicked. Some suggest that בְּלִיַּעַל ( bÿliyya ’ al ) is a compound of the negative בְּלִי ( bÿli ) and a noun יַעַל ( ya ’ al , “profit; worth”). Others suggest that the root is from בַּעַל ( ba ’ al , “lord [of goats]”) or a derivative of בָּלַע ( bala ’) with reduplication (“confusion” or “engulfing ruin”), or a proper name from Babylonian Bililu . See B. Otzen, TDOT 2:131-36; and D. W. Thomas, “ בְּלִיַּעַל in the Old Testament,” Biblical and Patristic Studies in Memory of Robert Pierce Casey , 11-19. Whatever the etymology, usage shows that the word describes people who violate the law ( Deut 15:9 ; Judg 19:22 ; 1 Kgs 21:10, 13 ; Prov 16:27 ; et al.) or act in a contemptuous and foolish manner against cultic observance or social institutions ( 1 Sam 10:27; 25:17; 30:22 ); cf. NRSV “a scoundrel and a villain” (NAB and NIV similar). The present instruction will focus on the devious practice of such wicked and worthless folk.


text: The sinister sign language and gestures of the perverse individual seem to indicate any kind of look or gesture that is put on and therefore a form of deception if not a way of making insinuations. W. McKane suggests from the presence of חֹרֵשׁ ( khoresh ) in v. 14 that there may be some use of magic here ( Proverbs [OTL], 325).


text: This saying involves a numerical ladder, paralleling six things with seven things (e.g., also 30:15, 18, 21, 24, 29 ). The point of such a numerical arrangement is that the number does not exhaust the list (W. M. Roth, “The Numerical Sequence x / x +1 in the Old Testament,” VT 12 [1962]: 300-311; and his “Numerical Sayings in the Old Testament,” VT 13 [1965]: 86).


text: The expression “high/ lofty [ רָמוֹת , ramot ] eyes” refers to a proud look suggesting arrogant ambition (cf. NCV “a proud look”). The use of “eyes” is a metonymy of adjunct, the look in the eyes accompanying the attitude. This term “high” is used in Num 15:30 for the sin of the “high hand,” i.e., willful rebellion or defiant sin. The usage of “haughty eyes” may be illustrated by its use with the pompous Assyrian invader ( Isa 10:12-14 ) and the proud king of the book of Daniel ( 11:12 ). God does not tolerate anyone who thinks so highly of himself and who has such ambition.


text: The hands are the instruments of murder (metonymy of cause), and God hates bloodshed. Gen 9:6 prohibited shedding blood because people are the image of God. Even David being a man of blood (in war mostly) was not permitted to build the Temple ( 1 Chr 22:8 ). But shedding innocent blood was a greater crime – it usually went with positions of power, such as King Manasseh filling the streets with blood ( 2 Kgs 21:16 ), or princes doing it for gain ( Ezek 22:27 ).


text: The Lord hates perjury and a lying witness (e.g., Ps 40:4 ; Amos 2:4 ; Mic 1:4 ). This is a direct violation of the law ().


text: Dissension is attributed in Proverbs to contentious people ( 21:9; 26:21; 25:24 ) who have a short fuse ( 15:8 ).


text: The figures used here are hypocatastases (implied comparisons). There may also be an allusion to where the people were told to bind the law on their foreheads and arms. The point here is that the disciple will never be without these instructions. See further, P. W. Skehan, Studies in Israelite Poetry and Wisdom (CBQMS), 1-8.


text: The Hebrew verb means “talk” in the sense of “to muse; to complain; to meditate”; cf. TEV, NLT “advise you.” Instruction bound to the heart will speak to the disciple on awaking.


text: The terms “lamp,” “light,” and “way” are all metaphors. The positive teachings and commandments will illumine or reveal to the disciple the way to life; the disciplinary correctives will provide guidance into fullness of life.


text: The description of the woman as a “strange woman” and now a “loose [ Heb “foreign”] woman” is within the context of the people of Israel. She is a “foreigner” in the sense that she is a nonconformist, wayward, and loose. It does not necessarily mean that she is not ethnically an Israelite.


text: “Fire” provides the analogy for the sage’s warning: Fire represents the sinful woman (hypocatastasis) drawn close, and the burning of the clothes the inevitable consequences of the liaison. See J. L. Crenshaw, “Impossible Questions, Sayings, and Tasks,” Semeia 17 (1980): 19-34. The word “fire” ( אֵשׁ , ’ esh ) plays on the words “man” ( אִישׁ ,’ ish ) and “woman” ( אִשָּׁה , ’ ishah ); a passage like this probably inspired R. Gamaliel’s little explanation that what binds a man and a woman together in a holy marriage is י ( yod ) and ה ( he ), the two main letters of the holy name Yah . But if the Lord is removed from the relationship, that is, if these two letters are removed, all that is left is the אֵשׁ – the fire of passion. Since Gamaliel was the teacher of Paul, this may have influenced Paul’s advice that it was better to marry than to burn ( 1 Cor 7:9 ).


text: The verb “touches” is intended here to be a euphemism for illegal sexual contact (e.g., Gen 20:6 ).


text: Even though the text has said that the man caught in adultery ruins his life, it does not mean that he was put to death, although that could have happened. He seems to live on in ignominy, destroyed socially and spiritually. He might receive blows and wounds from the husband and shame and disgrace from the spiritual community. D. Kidner observes that in a morally healthy society the adulterer would be a social outcast ( Proverbs [TOTC], 75).