Two Voices in the Street

“Proverbs” is mishlei, from mashal, a saying built on likeness, a comparison that makes one thing illuminate another. 1 Kings 4:32 credits Solomon with three thousand of them. The title heads the whole book, though later headings name Hezekiah’s men (25:1), Agur (30:1) and King Lemuel (31:1).

Verses 2 to 6 are a string of purpose clauses, each beginning “to”, the book stating what it is for before it says anything else. “Instruction” is musar, discipline or correction, the training that can include the rod. “Perceive” is from bin, to discern between, the root of binah, understanding.

“Instruction of wisdom” is musar haskel, schooling in prudent, successful conduct; haskel is the word for David behaving “wisely” before Saul (1 Samuel 18:14). “Equity” is mesharim, level or straight things, a road without ruts. The three nouns after it are the vocabulary of the law court, set in a textbook.

“Subtilty” is ormah, the root of the serpent’s description in Genesis 3:1, “more subtil than any beast”. What the serpent used for harm, the book offers as a good: shrewdness for the naive. “Discretion” is mezimmah, the power to devise a plan, a word that turns sinister in 12:2 and 14:17.

“Learning” is leqach, what is taken in, teaching received. “Wise counsels” is tachbulot, a word built on chevel, a rope; it seems to come from the sailor’s craft of steering by ropes, the skill of a helmsman. The already wise man is still learning to steer.

“Interpretation” is melitsah, an allusive or figurative saying; its only other appearance is the “taunting proverb” of Habakkuk 2:6. “Dark sayings” are chidot, riddles, the word for Samson’s riddle at his wedding (Judges 14:12) and the “hard questions” the queen of Sheba brought to Solomon (1 Kings 10:1).

“Beginning” is reshit, the first and also the chief part, the word of Genesis 1:1 and of firstfruits. The line is the book’s motto, and it returns at 9:10 to close the first section. The fools here are evilim, the thick, morally obtuse kind, who do not merely lack wisdom but look down on it.

“My son” opens a lecture, as Egyptian teachers such as Ptahhotep and Amenemope addressed their pupils. The mother’s “law” is torah, teaching, the same word used of the Law of Moses. The verse is repeated almost exactly at 6:20, a sign that it is the formula for a new lesson.

“Ornament of grace” is livyat chen, a garland, a wreath worn on festive days; 4:9 uses the same phrase of wisdom crowning the head. “Chains” are anaqim, necklaces or pendants, the neck ornaments of Judges 8:26. Teaching is worn in public, where others can see it.

“Entice” is from patah, the root of peti, the “simple” of verse 4: the simple man is precisely the one who can be enticed. “Consent thou not” is two Hebrew words, al tove, the shortest command in the lesson, set before the sinners are allowed a long speech.

“Lurk privily” is tsafan, to hide or store away, the same verb the father uses in 2:1 for hiding his commandments. The gang hides for blood; the son is told to hide words. “Without cause” is chinnam, gratis, for nothing: the victim has done nothing to earn it.

The men talk like Sheol itself, which swallows the living whole. Korah’s household went down alive into the pit, “quick into the pit” (Numbers 16:30–33). “Whole” is temimim, elsewhere the word for the blameless or “perfect” (2:21), so the victims they would swallow are the upright.

“Precious substance” is hon yaqar, and “spoil” is shalal, plunder taken in war; the gang describes street robbery in the language of conquest. Proverbs 24:4 uses hon and yaqar together again, of rooms filled with riches “by knowledge”, the honest way to furnish a house.

“Cast in thy lot” uses goral, the lot drawn for dividing plunder or land. The purse, kis, is the bag in which a merchant kept his weights and money (16:11, “all the weights of the bag”). The gang offers equal shares, which honest traders could not always promise.

“Way” and “path” are derek and netivah, the high road and the byway, so the command covers both the main route and any side track. “Refrain thy foot” is literally “withhold”, the same resolve as Psalm 119:101, “I have refrained my feet from every evil way”.

Isaiah 59:7 reuses the line against Jerusalem, and Paul quotes it in Romans 3:15, “Their feet are swift to shed blood.” Some of the oldest Greek manuscripts of Proverbs lack the verse altogether, which has led some to suspect it was added from Isaiah.

The Hebrew for “any bird” is ba’al kanaf, literally “owner of a wing”. “In vain” is chinnam, the word the gang used in verse 11 for their victims, “without cause”. Their free prey turns out to be themselves, and the net set for nothing catches the ones who set it.

The father reports their plan in their own two verbs, lay wait and lurk, and changes only the victim. Psalm 7:15 has the same turn, “He made a pit, and digged it, and is fallen into the ditch which he made”, and 26:27 of this book repeats it: “Whoso diggeth a pit shall fall therein.”

“Greedy of gain” is botsea batsa, from a verb meaning to cut off, to take a slice; it is the gain skimmed off unjustly. “Owners” is be’alav, its masters, the same ba’al that called the bird the owner of a wing in verse 17. Those who own such gain are owned by it.

“Wisdom” here is chokmot, a plural form, yet the verb is feminine singular: many-sided wisdom speaking as one woman. 9:1 uses the same form when she builds her house. “Without” means outside, in the open, against the hidden ambush of verses 11 and 18.

“The chief place of concourse” is rosh homiyot, the head of the noisy streets, where the roar of traffic is loudest; the Greek reads “on the tops of the walls”. The openings of the gates were where elders sat to judge and business was witnessed (Ruth 4:1, Deuteronomy 21:19).

“How long” is the prophets’ and the psalmists’ question, the words of Moses to Pharaoh, “How long wilt thou refuse” (Exodus 10:3). Three types are named: the simple, the scorners, and the kesilim, the dull and self-assured fools. Wisdom speaks to the first directly, then turns to speak of the other two.

“Turn” is shuv, the prophets’ word for repentance. “Pour out” is abi’ah, to make gush like a spring, the verb of Psalm 145:7 and of 18:4, not the shafach, the pouring of Joel 2:28. Wisdom’s spirit bubbles up rather than being tipped out.

Isaiah 65:2 has God say, “I have spread out my hands all the day unto a rebellious people”, and 65:12, “when I called, ye did not answer”. Wisdom speaks in that prophetic voice. The outstretched hand is the gesture of one beckoning someone to come, or pleading with them.

“Set at nought” is para, to let go loose, to leave unattended, the verb for letting hair hang unbound (Numbers 5:18). “Would none of” is lo avitem, you were not willing, the same verb as “consent” in verse 10: the son was told not to consent to sinners, and these would not consent to wisdom.

“Laugh” and “mock” are the pair of verbs Psalm 2:4 gives to God as the kings of the earth rise against him: “He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision.” “Your fear” is the thing you dread, not the feeling.

“Desolation” is sho’ah, a storm or ruinous devastation, the word Ezekiel 38:9 uses of an army coming “like a storm”. “Whirlwind” is sufah. “Distress and anguish” is tsarah vetsuqah, a rhyming pair that makes the double trouble sound like one blow.

Wisdom stops speaking to “you” and speaks of “them”, as if she has turned away. “Seek me early” is shachar, to seek eagerly, the root of the word for dawn. The same verb makes the opposite promise in 8:17: “those that seek me early shall find me.”

The motto of verse 7 returns as a thing that could have been chosen: “did not choose the fear of the LORD”. The verb is bachar, the word for Israel choosing whom to serve in Joshua 24:15. Knowledge was hated, and the fear of the LORD was passed over as one option among others.

“Despised” is na’ats, to spurn or treat with contempt, the verb of Numbers 14:11, “How long will this people provoke me?”, spoken after the report of the spies. “All my reproof” picks up verse 25; the charge is restated, as in a court record, before the sentence.

“Devices” is mo’etsot, counsels, the same root as the etsah, “counsel”, which they refused in verses 25 and 30. They would not have wisdom’s counsel and are filled with their own. “Be filled” is to be sated, eaten to surfeit, as Israel was with quails in Numbers 11:20.

“Turning away” is meshuvah, the word Jeremiah uses for faithless Israel, “backsliding Israel” (Jeremiah 3:6). It plays on the call of verse 23: turn at my reproof. There is turning either way, and one kills. “Prosperity” is shalvah, ease, the careless security of the untroubled.

“Dwell safely” is lavetach, in security, the phrase the Law uses for life in the land, “ye shall dwell in the land in safety” (Leviticus 25:18). “Be quiet” is sha’anan, at ease, the good counterpart of the fool’s complacent ease in the verse before.