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Selected Verse: Proverbs 2:17 - King James
| Verse |
Translation |
Text |
| Pr 2:17 |
King James |
Which forsaketh the guide of her youth, and forgetteth the covenant of her God. |
Summary Of Commentaries Associated With The Selected Verse
| A Commentary, Critical, Practical, and Explanatory on the Old and New Testaments, by Robert Jamieson, A.R. Fausset and David Brown [1882] |
guide . . . youth--lawful husband (Jer 3:4).
covenant . . . God--of marriage made in God's name. |
| Notes on the Bible, by Albert Barnes, [1834] |
The guide of her youth - Better, the familiar friend (compare Pro 16:28; Pro 17:9). The "friend" is, of course, the husband, or the man to whom the strange woman first belonged as a recognized concubine. Compare Jer 3:4
The covenant of her God - The sin of the adulteress is not against man only but against the Law of God, against His covenant. The words point to some religious formula of espousals. Compare Mal 2:14. |
| Commentary on the Old Testament, by Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch [1857-78] |
17 Who forsakes the companion of her youth,
And forgets the covenant of her God;
18 For she sinks down to death together with her house,
And to the shadow of Hades her paths -
19 All they who go to her return not again,
And reach not the paths of life
אלּוּף, as here used, has nothing to do with the phylarch-name, similar in sound, which is a denom. of אלף; but it comes immediately from אלף, to accustom oneself to a person or cause, to be familiar therewith (while the Aram. אלף, ילף, to learn, Pa. to teach), and thus means, as the synon. of רע, the companion or familiar associate (vid., Schultens). Parallels such as Jer 3:4 suggested to the old interpreters the allegorical explanation of the adulteress as the personification of the apostasy or of heresy. Pro 2:18 the lxx translate: ἔθετο γὰρ παρὰ τῷ θανάτῳ τὸν οἶκον αὐτῆς: she (the dissolute wife) has placed her house beside death (the abyss of death). This שׁחה [ἔθετο] is perhaps the original, for the text as it lies before us is doubtful, though, rightly understood, admissible. The accentuation marks בּיתהּ as the subject, but בּית is elsewhere always masc., and does not, like the rarer ארח, Pro 2:15, admit in usage a double gender; also, if the fem. usage were here introduced (Bertheau, Hitzig), then the predicate, even though ביתה were regarded as fem., might be, in conformity with rule, שׁח, as e.g., Isa 2:17. שׁחה is, as in Psa 44:26, 3rd pr. of שׁוּח, Arab. sâkh, to go down, to sink; the emendation שׁחה (Joseph Kimchi) does not recommend itself on this account, that שׁחה and שׁחח mean, according to usage, to stoop or to bend down; and to interpret (Ralbag, השׁפילה) שׁחה transitively is inadmissible. For that reason Aben Ezra interprets ביתה as in apposition: to death, to its house; but then the poet in that case should say אל־שׁאול, for death is not a house. On the other hand, we cannot perceive in ביתה an accus. of the nearer definition (J. H. Michaelis, Fl.); the expression would here, as 15a, be refined without purpose. Bttcher has recognised ביתה as permutative, the personal subject: for she sinks down to death, her house, i.e., she herself, together with all that belongs to her; cf. the permutative of the subject, Job 29:3; Isa 29:23 (vid., comm. l.c.), and the more particularly statement of the object, Exo 2:6, etc. Regarding רפאים, shadows of the under-world (from רפה, synon. חלה, weakened, or to become powerless), a word common to the Solomonic writings, vid., Comment. on Isaiah, p. 206. What Pro 2:18 says of the person of the adulteress, Pro 2:19 says of those who live with her ביתה, her house-companions. בּאיה, "those entering in to her," is equivalent to בּאים אליה; the participle of verbs eundi et veniendi takes the accusative object of the finite as gen. in st. constr., as e.g., Pro 1:12; Pro 2:7; Gen 23:18; Gen 9:10 (cf. Jer 10:20). The ישׁוּבוּן, with the tone on the ult., is a protestation: there is no return for those who practise fornication,
(Note: One is here reminded of the expression in the Aeneid, vi. 127-129:
Revocare gradum superasque evadere ad auras,
Hoc opes, hoc labor est.
See also an impure but dreadful Talmudic story about a dissolute Rabbi, b. Aboda zara, 17a.)
and they do not reach the paths of life from which they have so widely strayed.
(Note: In correct texts ולא־ישיגו has the Makkeph. Vid., Torath Emeth, p. 41; Accentuationssystem, xx. 2.) |
| Explanatory Notes on the Whole Bible, by John Wesley [1754-65] |
| Forsaketh - Her husband whom she took to be her guide and governor, in her youth. The covenant - The marriage covenant: so called because God is the author of that mutual obligation: and because God is called to be the witness and judge of that solemn promise and covenant. |
| Adam Clarke Commentary on the Whole Bible - Published 1810-1826 |
Which forsaketh the guide of her youth - Leaves her father's house and instructions, and abandons herself to the public.
The covenant of her God - Renounces the true religion, and mixes with idolaters; for among them prostitution was enormous. Or by the covenant may be meant the matrimonial contract, which is a covenant made in the presence of God between the contracting parties, in which they bind themselves to be faithful to each other. |
4 Wilt thou not from this time cry unto me, My father, thou art the guide of my youth?
14 Yet ye say, Wherefore? Because the LORD hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom thou hast dealt treacherously: yet is she thy companion, and the wife of thy covenant.
4 Wilt thou not from this time cry unto me, My father, thou art the guide of my youth?
9 He that covereth a transgression seeketh love; but he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends.
28 A froward man soweth strife: and a whisperer separateth chief friends.
20 My tabernacle is spoiled, and all my cords are broken: my children are gone forth of me, and they are not: there is none to stretch forth my tent any more, and to set up my curtains.
10 And with every living creature that is with you, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you; from all that go out of the ark, to every beast of the earth.
18 Unto Abraham for a possession in the presence of the children of Heth, before all that went in at the gate of his city.
7 He layeth up sound wisdom for the righteous: he is a buckler to them that walk uprightly.
12 Let us swallow them up alive as the grave; and whole, as those that go down into the pit:
19 None that go unto her return again, neither take they hold of the paths of life.
18 For her house inclineth unto death, and her paths unto the dead.
6 And when she had opened it, she saw the child: and, behold, the babe wept. And she had compassion on him, and said, This is one of the Hebrews' children.
23 But when he seeth his children, the work of mine hands, in the midst of him, they shall sanctify my name, and sanctify the Holy One of Jacob, and shall fear the God of Israel.
3 When his candle shined upon my head, and when by his light I walked through darkness;
26 Arise for our help, and redeem us for thy mercies' sake.
17 And the loftiness of man shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of men shall be made low: and the LORD alone shall be exalted in that day.
15 Whose ways are crooked, and they froward in their paths:
18 For her house inclineth unto death, and her paths unto the dead.
4 Wilt thou not from this time cry unto me, My father, thou art the guide of my youth?