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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Proverbs 9:10 - 9:10
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These words naturally follow:
10 “The beginning of wisdom is the fear of Jahve,
And the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.”
This is the highest principle of the Chokma, which stands (Pro 1:7) as a motto at the beginning of the Book of Proverbs. The lxx translate רֵאשׁיִת there (Pro 1:7), and תְּחִלַּת here, by ἀρχή. Gusset distinguishes the two synonyms as pars optima and primus actus; but the former denotes the fear of God as that which stands in the uppermost place, to which all that Wisdom accomplishes subordinates itself; the latter as that which begins wisdom, that which it proposes to itself in its course. With יהוה is interchanged, Pro 2:5, אלהים, as here קְדוֹשִׁים, as the internally multiplicative plur. (Dietrich, Abhandlungen, pp. 12, 45), as Pro 30:3, Jos 24:9; Hos 12:1, of God, the “Holy, holy, holy” (Isa 6:3), i.e., Him who is absolutely Holy. Michaelis inaccurately, following the ancients, who understood not this non-numerical plur.: cognitio quae sanctos facit et sanctis propria est. The דַּעַת, parallel with יִרְאַת, is meant of lively practical operative knowledge, which subordinates itself to this All-holy God as the normative but unapproachable pattern.