Keil and Delitzsch Commentary - Proverbs 19:6 - 19:6

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Keil and Delitzsch Commentary - Proverbs 19:6 - 19:6


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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

6 Many stroke the cheeks of the noble;

And the mass of friends belongeth to him who gives.

The phrase 'חַלּוֹת פְּנֵי פל signifies to stroke the face of any one, from the fundamental meaning of the verb חָלָה, to rub, to stroke, Arab. khala, with which the Heb., meaning to be sick, weak (viribus attritum esse), and the Arabic: to be sweet (properly laevem et politum, glabrum esse, or palatum demulcere, leniter stringere, contrast asperum esse ad gustum), are connected (Fl.). The object of such insinuating, humble suing for favour is the נָדִיב (from נָדָב, instigare), the noble, he who is easily incited to noble actions, particularly to noble-mindedness in bestowing gifts and in doing good, or who feels himself naturally impelled thereto, and spontaneously practises those things; cf. the Arab. krym, nobilis and liberalis (Fl.), and at Job 21:28; parall. אִישׁ מַתָּן, a man who gives willingly, as אִישׁ חֵמָה, Pro 15:18, one who is easily kindled into anger. Many (רַבִּים, as Job 11:19) stroke the face of the liberal (Lat. caput mulcent or demulcent); and to him who gives willingly and richly belongs כָל־הָרֵעַ, the mass (the totality) of good friends, cf. Pro 15:17; there the art. of הָרֵעַ, according to the manner of expression of the Arab. grammarians, stood for “the exhaustion of the characteristic properties of the genus”: the friend who corresponds to the nature (the idea) of such an one; here it stands for “the comprehension of the individuals of the genus;” all that is only always friend. It lies near with Ewald and Hitzig to read וְכֻלֹּה רֵעַ (and every one is friend...) (כלֹּה = כלּוֹ, as Jer 8:10, etc.); but why could not כָל־הָרֵעַ be used as well as כל־האדם, perhaps with the sarcastic appearance which the above translation seeks to express? The lxx also had וכל הרע in view, which it incorrectly translates πᾶς δὲ ὁ κακός, whereby the Syr. and the Targ. are led into error; but מַתָּן is not one and the same with שֹׂחַד, vid., Pro 18:6. On the contrary, there certainly lies before us in Pro 19:7 a mutilated text. The tristich is, as we have shown, vol. i, p. 15, open to suspicion; and the violence which its interpretation needs in order to comprehend it, as a formal part of 7ab, places it beyond a doubt, and the lxx confirms it that 7c is the remainder of a distich, the half of which is lost.