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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Proverbs 11:21 - 11:21
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21 Assuredly the hand to it the wicked remaineth not unpunished,
But the seed of the righteous is delivered.
The lxx render here, as Pro 16:5, where the יָד לְיָד repeats itself, χειρὶ χεῖρας ἐμβαλὼν ἀδίκως, which is not to be understood, as Evagrius supposes, of one that can be bribed, but only of a violent person; the Syr. and Targ. have the same reference; but the subject is certainly רָע, and a governing word, as נֹשֵׂא (2Sa 20:21), is wanting, to say nothing of the fact that the phrase “one hand against the other” would require the words to be יד ביד. Jerome and the Graec. Venet., without our being able, however, to see their meaning. The translation of the other Greek versions is not given. The Jewish interpreters offer nothing that is worthy, as e.g., Immanuel and Meîri explain it by “immediately,” which in the modern Hebr. would require מִיָּד, and besides is not here suitable. The Midrash connects with 21a the earnest warning that he who sins with the one hand and with the other does good, is nevertheless not free from punishment. Schultens has an explanation to give to the words which is worthy of examination: hand to hand, i.e., after the manner of an inheritance per posteros (Exo 20:5), resting his opinion on this, that Arab. yad (cf. יָד, Isa 56:5) is used among other significations in that of authorizing an inheritance. Gesenius follows him, but only urging the idea of the sequence of time (cf. Pers. dest bedest, hand to hand = continuing after one another), and interprets יד ביד as Fleischer does: ab aetate in aetatem non (i.e., nullo unquam tempore futuro) erit impunis scelestus, sed posteri justorum salvi erunt. According to Böttcher, “hand to hand” is equivalent to from one hand to another, and this corresponds to the thought expressed in Plutarch's de sera numinis vindicta: if not immediately, yet at last. We may refer in vindication of this to the fact that, as the Arab. lexicographers say, yad, used of the course of time, means the extension (madd) of time, and then a period of time. But for the idea expressed by nunquam, or neutiquam, or tandem aliquando, the language supplied to the poet a multitude of forms, and we do not see why he should have selected just this expression with its primary meaning alternatim not properly agreeing with the connection. Therefore we prefer with Ewald to regard יד ליד as a formula confirmation derived from the common speech of the people: hand to hand (לְ as in לְיָדִי, Job 17:3), i.e., the hand for it I pledge it, guarantee it (Bertheau, Hitzig, Elster, Zöckler). But if 21a assures by the pledge of the hand, and as it were lays a wager to it, that the wicked shall not go unpunished, then the genitive in זֶרַע צַדִּיקִים is not that of dependence by origin, but, as Isa 65:23; Isa 1:4, the genitive of apposition, for זרע here, as דּוֹר, Psa 24:6; Psa 112:2, denotes a oneness of like origin and of like kind, but with a preponderance of the latter. נִמְלָֽט is the 3rd pret., which by the preceding fut. retains the reference to the future: the merited punishment comes on the wicked, but the generation of the righteous escapes the judgment. רָּע has the ר dagheshed (Michlol 63d) according to the rule of the דחיק, according to which the consonant first sounded after the word terminating in an accented a or é is doubled, which is here, as at Pro 15:1, done with the ר.