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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Proverbs 2:12 - 2:12
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
As in Pro 2:10, Pro 2:11, the אָז תָּבֵּין (“then shalt thou understand,” Pro 2:5) is expanded, so now the watching, preserving, is separately placed in view:
12 To deliver thee from an evil way,
From the man who speaks falsehood;
13 (From those) who forsake the ways of honesty
To walk in ways of darkness,
14 Who rejoice to accomplish evil,
Delight in malignant falsehood -
15 They are crooked in their paths,
And perverse in their ways.
That דֶּרֶךְ רָע is not genitival, via mali, but adjectival, via mala, is evident from דרך לא־טוב, Pro 16:29. From the evil way, i.e., conduct, stands opposed to the false words represented in the person of the deceiver; from both kinds of contagium wisdom delivers. תַּהְפֻּכוֹת (like the similarly formed תַּחְבֻּוֹת, occurring only as plur.) means misrepresentations, viz., of the good and the true, and that for the purpose of deceiving (Pro 17:20), fallaciae, i.e., intrigues in conduct, and lies and deceit in words. Fl. compares Arab. ifk, a lie, and affak, a liar. לְהַצִּילְךָ has Munach, the constant servant of Dechî, instead of Metheg, according to rule (Accentssystem, vii. §2). הַעֹזְבִים (Pro 2:13) is connected with the collective אִישׁ (cf. Jdg 9:55); we have in the translation separated it into a relative clause with the abstract present. The vocalization of the article fluctuates, yet the expression הַעזבים, like Pro 2:17 הַעזבת, is the better established (Michlol 53b); הַעֹזְבִים is one of the three words which retain their Metheg, and yet add to it a Munach in the tone-syllable (vid., the two others, Job 22:4; Job 39:26). To the “ways of honesty” (Geradheit) (cf. the adj. expression, Jer 31:9), which does not shun to come to the light, stand opposed the “ways of darkness,” the ἔργα τοῦ σκότους, Rom 13:12, which designedly conceal themselves from God (Isa 29:15) and men (Job 24:15; Job 38:13, Job 38:15).
Pro 2:14
In this verse the regimen of the מִן, 12b, is to be regarded as lost; the description now goes on independently. Whoever does not shrink back from evil, but gives himself up to deceit, who finally is at home in it as in his own proper life-element, and rejoices, yea, delights in that which he ought to shun as something destructive and to be rejected. The neut. רָע is frequently an attributive genit., Pro 6:24; Pro 15:26; Pro 28:5; cf. טוֹב, Pro 24:25, which here, since תַּהְפֻּכוֹת are those who in themselves are bad, does not separate, but heightens: perversitates non simplices aut vulgares, sed pessimae et ex omni parte vitiosae (J. H. Michaelis). With אֲשֶׁר (οἵτινες), Pro 2:15, this part is brought to a conclusion. Fleischer, Bertheau, and others interpret אָרְחֹתֵיהֶם, as the accus. of the nearer definition, as σκολιὸς τὸν νοῦν, τὰς πράξεις; but should it be an accus., then would we expect, in this position of the words, עִקְּשׁוּ (Isa 59:8; Pro 10:8, cf. Pro 9:15). עִקְּשִׁים is the pred.; for אֹרַח, like דֶּרֶךְ, admits of both genders. וּנְלוֹזִים carries in it its subject הֵם; לוּז, like the Arab. l'd, l'dh, is a weaker form of לוּץ, flectere, inclinare, intrans. recedere: they are turned aside, inclined out of the way to the right and left in their walk (בְּ as Pro 17:20).