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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Proverbs 7:10 - 7:10
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Finally, the young man devoid of understanding sees his waiting rewarded: like meets like.
10 And, lo, a woman coming to meet him,
In the attire of an harlot and of subtle heart.
11 Boisterous is she, and ungovernable;
Her feet have no rest in her own house.
12 At one time before her door, at another in the street,
And again at every corner she places herself on the watch.
“Pro 7:12 (Hitzig) expresses what is wont to be, instead of a single event, Pro 7:11, viz., the custom of a street harlot. But she who is spoken of is not such an one; lurking is not applicable to her (cf. Job 31:9), and, Pro 7:11, it is not meant that she is thus inclined.” But Hitzig's rendering of Pro 7:11, “she was boisterous ... in her house her feet had no rest,” is inaccurate, since neither הִיאוְ nor שָֽׁכְנוּ is used. Thus in Pro 7:11 and Pro 7:12 the poet gives a characteristic of the woman, introduced by הִנֵּהוְ into the frame of his picture, which goes beyond that which then presented itself to his eyes. We must with Pro 7:12 reject also Pro 7:11; and even that would not be a radical improvement, since that characteristic lying behind the evident, that which was then evident begins with וּנְצֻרַת לֵב (and subtle in heart). We must thus suppose that the woman was not unknown to the observer here describing her. He describes her first as she then appeared. שִׁית Hitzig regards as equivalent to שְׁוִית, similitude (from שָׁוָה), and why? Because שִׁית does not mean “to lay against,” but “to place.” But Exo 33:4 shows the contrary, and justifies the meaning attire, which the word also has in Psa 73:6. Meîri less suitably compares 2Ki 9:30, but rightly explains תקון (dressing, ornament), and remarks that שׁית elliptical is equivalent to בְּשִׁית. It is not the nominative (Bertheau), but the accusative, as תבנית, Psa 144:12, Ewald, §279d. How Hitzig reaches the translation of ונצרת לב by “and an arrow in her heart” (et saucia corde)
(Note: Virgil's Aeneid, iv. 1.)
one can only understand by reading his commentary. The usage of the language, Pro 4:23, he remarks, among other things, would stamp her as a virtuous person. As if a phrase like נָצַר לֵב could be used both sensu bono and sensu malo! One can guard his heart when he protects it carefully against moral danger, or also when he purposely conceals that which is in it. The part. נָצוּר signifies, Isa 1:8, besieged (blockaded), Eze 16:12, protected, guarded, and Isa 48:6; Isa 65:4, concealed, hidden. Ewald, §187b, refers these three significations in the two passages in Isaiah and in the passage before us to צָרַר, Niph. נָצֹר (as נָגֹל); but (1) one would then more surely take צוּר (cf. נִמּוֹל, נְבֻכִים) as the verbal stem; (2) one reaches the idea of the concealed (the hidden) easier from that of the preserved than from that of the confined. As one says in Lat. homo occultus, tectus, abstrusus, in the sense of κρυψίνους, so it is said of that woman נצֻרת לב, not so much in the sense of retenta cor, h.e. quae quod in corde haberet non pandebat, Fr. retenue (Cocc.), as in the sense of custodita cor, quae intentionem cordis mentemque suam callide novit premere (Mich.): she is of a hidden mind, of a concealed nature; for she feigns fidelity to her husband and flatters her paramours as her only beloved, while in truth she loves none, and each of them is to her only a means to an end, viz., to the indulgence of her worldly sensual desire. For, as the author further describes here, she is הֹמִיָּה (fem. of הֹמֶה = הֹמַי, as Pro 1:21; Isa 22:2), tumultuosa, externally as internally impetuous, because full of intermingling lust and deceit (opp. ἡσύχιος, 1Pe 3:4; 1Ti 2:11), and סֹרָרֶת, self-willed, not minding the law of duty, of discretion, or of modesty (from סָרַר, Arab. sharr, pervicacem, malum esse). She is the very opposite of the noiseless activity and the gentle modesty of a true house-wife, rude, stubborn, and also vagrant like a beast in its season (Hos 4:14): in domo ipsius residere nequeunt pedes ejus; thus not οἰκουρός or οἰκουργός (Tit 2:5), far removed from the genuine woman - like εἴσω ἥσυχον μένειν δόμων
(Note: Eurip. Herac.) - a radt, as they call such a one in Arab. (Wünsche on Hos 12:1)
or as she is called in Aram. נָֽפְקַת בָּרָא.
Pro 7:12
This verse shows how she conducts herself when she wanders abroad. It is no common street-walker who is designated (no “Husterin,” Arab. ḳaḥbt, after which also the female demon-name (Arab.) se'alâ is explained), but that licentious married wife, who, no better than such a strumpet when she wanders abroad, hunts after lovers. The alternating פַּעַם (properly a stroke) Fleischer compares with the Arab. synonyms, marrt, a going over, karrt, a going back, una volta, una fiata, une fois (Orelli, Synon. der Zeit und Ewigkeit, p. 51). Regarding חוּץ, vid., at Pro 5:16 : it is the free space without, before the house-door, or also before the gate of the city; the parallelism speaks here and at Pro 1:20 more in favour of the former signification.