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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Proverbs 10:3 - 10:3
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Another proverb, the members of which stand in chiastic relation to those of the preceding:
Jahve does not suffer the soul of the righteous to hunger;
But the craving of the godless He disappointeth.
The thought is the same as Pro 13:25. There, as also at Pro 6:30, the soul is spoken of as the faculty of desire, and that after nourishment, for the lowest form of the life of the soul is the impulse to self-preservation. The parallel הַוָּה, in which lxx and Ar. erroneously find the meaning of חַיָּה, life, the Syr. Targ. the meaning of הוֹן, possession, means the desire, without however being related to אַוָּה (Berth.); it is the Arab. hawan, from הָוָה, Arab. haway, which, from the fundamental meaning χαίνειν, hiare, to gape, yawn, signifies not only unrestrained driving along, and crashing overthrow (cf. Pro 11:6; Pro 19:13), but also the breaking forth, ferri in aliquid, whence הַוָּה, Arab. hawan, violent desire, in Hebr. generally (here and Psa 52:9, Mich. Pro 7:3) of desire without limits and without restraint (cf. the plur. âhawâ, arbitrary actions, caprices); the meanings deduced from this important verbal stem (of which also הָוָה הָיָה, accidere, and then esse, at least after the Arabic conception of speech, is an offshoot) are given by Fleischer under Job 37:6, and after Fleischer by Ethé, Schlafgemach der Phantasie, ii. p. 6f. The verb הָדַף signifies to push in the most manifold shades, here to push forth, repellere, as 2Ki 4:27 (cf. Arab. ḥadhaf, to push off = to discharge); the fut. is invariably יֶהְדֹּף, like יֶהְגֶּה. God gives satisfaction to the soul of the righteous, viz., in granting blessings. The desire of the wicked He does not suffer to be accomplished; it may appear for a long time as if that which was aimed at was realized, but in the end God pushes it back, so that it remains at a distance, because contrary to Him. Instead of והות רְשָׁעִים, some editions (Plantin 1566, Bragadin 1615) have והות בֹּֽגְדִים, but, in opposition to all decided testimony, only through a mistaken reference to Pro 11:6.