24 It is a crown to the wise when they are rich;
But the folly of fools remains folly.
From Pro 12:4, 31; Pro 17:6, we see that עטרת חכמים is the predicate. Thus it is the riches of the wise of which it is said that they are a crown or an ornament to them. More than this is said, if with Hitzig we read, after the lxx, ערמם, their prudence, instead of עשׁרם. For then the meaning would be, that the wise need no other crown than that which they have in their prudence. But yet far more appropriately "riches" are called the crown of a wise man when they come to his wisdom; for it is truly thus that riches, when they are possessed along with wisdom, contribute not a little to heighten its influence and power, and not merely because they adorn in their appearance like a crown, or, as we say, surround as with a golden frame, but because they afford a variety of means and occasions for self-manifestation which are denied to the poor. By this interpretation of 24a, 24b comes out also into the light, without our requiring to correct the first אוּלת, or to render it in an unusual sense. The lxx and Syr. translate the first אולת by διατριβή (by a circumlocution), the Targ. by gloria, fame - we know not how they reach this. Schultens in his Com. renders: crassa opulentia elumbium crassities, but in his Animadversiones he combines the first אולת with the Arab. awwale, precedence, which Gesen. approves of. But although the meaning to be thick (properly coalescere) appertains to the verbal stem אול as well as the meaning to be before (Arab. âl, âwila, wâl), yet the Hebr. אוּלת always and everywhere means only folly,
(Note: Ewald's derivation of אויל from און = אוין, null, vain, is not much better than Heidenheim's from אולי: one who says "perhaps" = a sceptic, vid., p. 59, note.)
from the fundamental idea crassities (thickness). Hitzig's אוּלת (which denotes the consequence with which the fool invests himself) we do not accept, because this word is Hitzig's own invention. Rather לוית is to be expected: the crown with which fools adorn themselves is folly. But the sentence: the folly of fools is (and remains) folly (Symmachus, Jerome, Venet., Luther), needs the emendation as little as Pro 16:22, for, interpreted in connection with 24a, it denotes that while wisdom is adorned and raised up by riches, folly on the other hand remains, even when connected with riches, always the same, without being either thereby veiled or removed - on the contrary, the fool, when he is rich, exhibits his follies always more and more. C. B. Michaelis compares Lucian's simia est simia etiamsi aurea gestet insignia. |