Keil and Delitzsch Commentary - Proverbs 7:6 - 7:6

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Keil and Delitzsch Commentary - Proverbs 7:6 - 7:6


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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

How necessary it is for the youth to guard himself by the help of wisdom against the enticements of the wanton woman, the author now shows by a reference to his own observation.

6 For through the window of my house,

From behind the lattice I looked out;

7 Then saw I among the simple ones,

Discerned among the young people, a youth devoid of understanding.

כִּי refers indeed to the immediately following clause, yet it actually opens up the whole following exemplification. The connection with Pro 7:5 would be closer if instead of the extended Semitic construction it were said: nam quum ...prospicerem vidi, etc. חַלּוֹן (from חָלַל, to bore through) is properly a place where the wall is bored through. אֶשְׁנָב .hguor (from שָׁנַב = Arab. shaniba, to be agreeable, cool, fresh) is the window-lattice or lattice-window, i.e., lattice for drawing down and raising up, which keeps off the rays of the sun. נִשְׁקַף signifies primarily to make oneself long in order to see, to stretch up or out the neck and the head, καραδοκεῖν, Arab. atall, atal'a, and tatall'a of things, imminere, to overtop, to project, to jut in; cf. Arab. askaf of the ostrich, long and bent, with respect to the neck stretching it up, sakaf, abstr. crooked length. And בְּעַד is thus used, as in Arab. duna, but not b'ad, is used: so placed, that one in relation to the other obstructs the avenue to another person or thing: “I looked forth from behind the lattice-window, i.e., with respect to the persons or things in the room, standing before the lattice-window, and thus looking out into the open air” (Fleischer). That it was far in the night, as we learn at Pro 7:9, does not contradict this looking out; for apart from the moon, and especially the lighting of the streets, there were star-lit nights, and to see what the narrator saw there was no night of Egyptian darkness. But because it was night 6a is not to be translated: I looked about among those devoid of experience (thus e.g., Löwenstein); but he saw among these, observed among the youths, who thus late amused themselves without, a young man whose want of understanding was manifest from what further happened. Bertheau: that I might see, is syntactically impossible. The meaning of וָאֵרֶא is not determined by the אָבִינָה following, but conversely אָבִינָה stands under the operation of וָ (= אָבינה, Neh 13:7), characterizing the historic aorist. Regarding פְּתִי, vid., at Pro 1:4. בָּנִים is the masc. of בָּנוֹת, Arab. benât in the meaning maiden. בַבָּנִים has in correct texts, according to the rules of the accents, the ב raphatum.

(Note: Regarding the Targ. of Pro 7:6-7, vid., Perles, Etymologische Studien, 1871, p. 9.)