Pro 24:7-10 | KD | STEP | Till now in this appendix we have found only two distichs ( vid ., vol. i. p. 17); now several of them follow. From this, that wisdom is a power which accomplishes great things, it follows that it is of high value, though to the fool it appears all too costly. 7 Wisdom seems to the fool to be an ornamental commodity; He openeth not his mouth in the gate. Most interpreters take ראמות for רמות (written as at ; cf. Zec 14:10; ראשׁ, ; קאם, Hos 10:14), and translate, as Jerome and Luther: “Wisdom is to the fool too high;” the way to wisdom is to him too long and too steep, the price too costly, and not to be afforded. Certainly this thought does not lie far distant from what the poet would say; but why does he say חכמות, and not חכמה? This חכמות is not a numerical plur., so as to be translated with the Venet .: μετέωροι τῷ ἄφρονι αἱ ἐπιστῆμαι; it is a plur., as shows; but, as is evident from the personification and the construction, , one inwardly multiplying and heightening, which is related to חכמה as science or the contents of knowledge is to knowledge. That this plur. comes here into view as in chap. 1-9 ( vid ., vol. i. p. 34), is definitely accounted for in these chapters by the circumstance that wisdom was to be designated, which is the mediatrix of all wisdom; here, to be designated in intentional symphony with ראמות, whose plur. ending ôth shall be for that very reason, however, inalienable. Thus ראמות will be the name of a costly foreign bijouterie , which is mentioned in the Book of Job, where the unfathomableness and inestimableness of wisdom is celebrated; vid ., , where we have recorded what we had to say at the time regarding this word. But what is now the meaning of the saying that wisdom is to the fool a pearl or precious coral? Joël Bril explains: “The fool uses the sciences like a precious stone, only for ornament, but he knows not how to utter a word publicly,” This is to be rejected, because ראמות is not so usual a trinket or ornament as to serve as an expression of this thought. The third of the comparison lies in the rarity, costliness, unattainableness; the fool despises wisdom, because the expenditure of strength and the sacrifices of all kinds which are necessary to put one into the possession of wisdom deter him from it (Rashi). This is also the sense which the expression has when ראמות = רמות; and probably for the sake of this double meaning the poet chose just this word, and not פנינים, גבישׁ, or any other name, for articles of ornament (Hitzig). The Syr. has incorrectly interpreted this play upon words: sapientia abjecta stulto ; and the Targumist: the fool grumbles (מתרעם) against wisdom. He may also find the grapes to be sour because they hang too high for him; here it is only said that wisdom remains at a distance from him because he cannot soar up to its attainment; for that very reason he does not open his mouth in the gate, where the council and the representatives of the people have their seats: he has not the knowledge necessary for being associated in counselling, and thus must keep silent; and this is indeed the most prudent thing he can do.

‏ Proverbs 24:7-10

Till now in this appendix we have found only two distichs (vid., vol. i. p. 17); now several of them follow. From this, that wisdom is a power which accomplishes great things, it follows that it is of high value, though to the fool it appears all too costly. 7 Wisdom seems to the fool to be an ornamental commodity; He openeth not his mouth in the gate.

Most interpreters take ראמות for רמות (written as at 1Ch 6:58; cf. Zec 14:10; ראשׁ, Pro 10:4; קאם, Hos 10:14), and translate, as Jerome and Luther: “Wisdom is to the fool too high;” the way to wisdom is to him too long and too steep, the price too costly, and not to be afforded. Certainly this thought does not lie far distant from what the poet would say; but why does he say חכמות, and not חכמה? This חכמות is not a numerical plur., so as to be translated with the Venet.: μετέωροι τῷ ἄφρονι αἱ ἐπιστῆμαι; it is a plur., as Psa 49:4 shows; but, as is evident from the personification and the construction, Pro 1:20, one inwardly multiplying and heightening, which is related to חכמה as science or the contents of knowledge is to knowledge. That this plur. comes here into view as in chap. 1-9 (vid., vol. i. p. 34), is definitely accounted for in these chapters by the circumstance that wisdom was to be designated, which is the mediatrix of all wisdom; here, to be designated in intentional symphony with ראמות, whose plur. ending ôth shall be for that very reason, however, inalienable. Thus ראמות will be the name of a costly foreign bijouterie, which is mentioned in the Book of Job, where the unfathomableness and inestimableness of wisdom is celebrated; vid., Job 27:18, where we have recorded what we had to say at the time regarding this word. But what is now the meaning of the saying that wisdom is to the fool a pearl or precious coral? Joël Bril explains: “The fool uses the sciences like a precious stone, only for ornament, but he knows not how to utter a word publicly,” This is to be rejected, because ראמות is not so usual a trinket or ornament as to serve as an expression of this thought. The third of the comparison lies in the rarity, costliness, unattainableness; the fool despises wisdom, because the expenditure of strength and the sacrifices of all kinds which are necessary to put one into the possession of wisdom deter him from it (Rashi). This is also the sense which the expression has when ראמות = רמות; and probably for the sake of this double meaning the poet chose just this word, and not פנינים, גבישׁ, or any other name, for articles of ornament (Hitzig). The Syr. has incorrectly interpreted this play upon words: sapientia abjecta stulto; and the Targumist: the fool grumbles (מתרעם) against wisdom. ^{▼▼This explanation is more correct than Levy's: he lifts himself up (boasts) with wisdom.}

He may also find the grapes to be sour because they hang too high for him; here it is only said that wisdom remains at a distance from him because he cannot soar up to its attainment; for that very reason he does not open his mouth in the gate, where the council and the representatives of the people have their seats: he has not the knowledge necessary for being associated in counselling, and thus must keep silent; and this is indeed the most prudent thing he can do. Pro 24:8

From wisdom, which is a moral good, the following proverb passes over to a kind of σοφία δαιμονιώδης:

He that meditateth to do evil,

We call such an one an intriguer.

A verbal explanation and definition like Pro 21:24 (cf. p. 29), formed like Pro 16:21 from נבון. Instead of בּעל־מזמּות [lord of mischief] in Pro 12:2, the expression is 'אישׁ מ (cf. at Pro 22:24). Regarding מזמות in its usual sense, vid., Pro 5:2. Such definitions have of course no lexicographical, but only a moral aim. That which is here given is designed to warn one against gaining for himself this ambiguous title of a refined (cunning, versutus) man; one is so named whose schemes and endeavours are directed to the doing of evil. One may also inversely find the turning-point of the warning in 8b: “he who projects deceitful plans against the welfare of others, finds his punishment in this, that he falls under public condemnation as a worthless intriguer” (Elster). But מזמות is a ῥῆμα μέσον, vid., Pro 5:2; the title is thus equivocal, and the turning-point lies in the bringing out of his kernel: מחשּׁב להרע = meditating to do evil. Pro 24:9

This proverb is connected by זמת with Pro 24:8, and by אויל with Pro 24:7; it places the fool and the mocker over against one another.

The undertaking of folly is sin;

And an abomination to men is the scorner.

Since it is certain that for 9b the subject is “the scorner,” so also “sin” is to be regarded as the subject of 9a. The special meaning flagitium, as Pro 21:27, זמּה will then not have here, but it derives it from the root-idea “to contrive, imagine,” and signifies first only the collection and forthputting of the thoughts towards a definite end (Job 17:11), particularly the refined preparation, the contrivance of a sinful act. In a similar way we speak of a sinful beginning or undertaking. But if one regards sin in itself, or in its consequences, it is always a contrivance or desire of folly (gen. subjecti), or: one that bears on itself (gen. qualitatis) the character of folly; for it disturbs and destroys the relation of man to God and man, and rests, as Socrates in Plato says, on a false calculation. And the mocker (the mocker at religion and virtue) is תועבת לאדם. The form of combination stands here before a word with ל, as at Job 18:2; Job 24:5, and frequently. but why does not the poet say directly תועבת אדם? Perhaps to leave room for the double sense, that the mocker is not only an abomination to men, viz., to the better disposed; but also, for he makes others err as to their faith, and draws them into his frivolous thoughts, becomes to them a cause of abomination, i.e., of such conduct and of such thoughts as are an abomination before God (Pro 15:9, Pro 15:26). Pro 24:10

The last of these four distichs stands without visible connection:

Hast thou shown thyself slack in the day of adversity,

Then is thy strength small.

The perf. 10a is the hypothetic, vid., at Pro 22:29. If a man shows himself remiss (Pro 18:9), i.e., changeable, timorous, incapable of resisting in times of difficulty, then shall he draw therefrom the conclusion which is expressed in 10b. Rightly Luther, with intentional generalization, “he is not strong who is not firm in need.” But the address makes the proverb an earnest admonition, which speaks to him who shows himself weak the judgment which he has to pronounce on himself. And the paronomasia צרה and צר may be rendered, where possible, “if thy strength becomes, as it were, pressed together and bowed down by the difficulty just when it ought to show itself (viz., להרחיב לך), then it is limited, thou art a weakling.” Thus Fleischer accordingly, translating: si segnis fueris die angustiae, angustae sunt vires tuae. Hitzig, on the contrary, corrects after Job 7:11, רוּחך “Klemm (klamm) ist dein Mut” [= strait is thy courage]. And why? Of כסה [strength], he remarks, one can say כשׁל [it is weak] (Psa 31:11), but scarcely צר [strait, straitened]; for force is exact, and only the region of its energy may be wide or narrow. To this we answer, that certainly of strength in itself we cannot use the word כסה drow eht esu t in the sense here required; the confinement (limitation) may rather be, as with a stream, Isa 59:19, the increasing (heightening) of its intensity. But if the strength is in itself anything definite, then on the other hand its expression is something linear, and the force in view of its expression is that which is here called צר, i.e., not extending widely, not expanding, not inaccessible. צר is all to which narrow limits are applied. A little strength is limited, because it is little also in its expression.