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Selected Verse: Proverbs 8:24 - Webster
| Verse |
Translation |
Text |
| Pr 8:24 |
Webster |
When there were no depths, I was brought forth; when there were no fountains abounding with water. |
| |
King James |
When there were no depths, I was brought forth; when there were no fountains abounding with water. |
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] |
brought forth--(Compare Psa 90:2).
abounding--or, "laden with water." |
| Notes on the Bible, by Albert Barnes, [1834] |
| Compare Gen. 1; Job 22; Job 26:1-14; 38: A world of waters, "great deeps" lying in darkness, this was the picture of the remotest time of which man could form any conception, and yet the co-existence of the uncreated Wisdom with the eternal Yahweh was before that. |
| Commentary on the Old Testament, by Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch [1857-78] |
This her existence before the world began is now set forth in yet more explicit statements:
24 "When there were as yet no floods was I brought forth,
When as yet there were not fountains which abounded with water;
25 For before the mountains were settled,
Before the hills was I brought forth,
26 While as yet He had not made land and plains,
And the sum of the dust of the earth."
The description is poetical, and affords some room for imagination. By תּהומות are not intended the unrestrained primeval waters, but, as also Pro 3:20, the inner waters, treasures of the earth; and consequently by מעינות, not the fountains of the sea on this earth (Ewald, after Job 38:16), but he springs or places of springs (for מעין is n. loci to עין, a well as an eye of the earth; vid., Gen 16:7), by means of which the internal waters of the earth communicate themselves to the earth above (cf. Gen 7:11 with Gen 49:25). נכבּדּי־מים(abounding with water) is a descriptive epitheton to מעינות, which, notwithstanding its fem. plur., is construed as masc. (cf. Pro 5:16). The Masora does not distinguish the thrice-occurring נכבדי according to its form as written (Isa 23:8-9). The form נכבּדּי (which, like בּתּים, would demand Metheg) is to be rejected; it is everywhere to be written נכבּדּי nettirw (Ewald, 214b) with Pathach, with Dagesh following; vid., Kimchi, Michlol 61b. Kimchi adds the gloss מעיני מים רבים, which the Gr. Venet., in accordance with the meaning of נכבד elsewhere, renders by πηγαῖς δεδοξασμένων ὑδάτων (as also Bttcher: the most honoured = the most lordly); but Meri, Immanuel, and others rightly judge that the adjective is here to be understood after Gen 13:2; Job 14:21 (but in this latter passage כבד does not mean "to be numerous"): loaded = endowed in rich measure.
Pro 8:25
Instead of בּאין, in (yet) non-existence (24), we have here טרם, a subst. which signifies cutting off from that which already exists (vid., at Gen 2:5), and then as a particle nondum or antequam, with בּ always antequam, and in Pro 8:26 עד־לא, so long not yet (this also originally a substantive from עדה, in the sense of progress). With הטבּעוּ (were settled) (as Job 38:6, from טבע, to impress into or upon anything, imprimere, infigere) the question is asked: wherein? Not indeed: in the depths of the earth, but as the Caraite Ahron b. Joseph answers, אל קרקע הים, in the bottom of the sea; for out of the waters they rise up, Psa 104:8 (cf. at Gen 1:9).
Pro 8:26
ארץ וחוּצות is either, connecting the whole with its part: terra cum campis, or ארץ gains by this connection the meaning of land covered with buildings, while חוצות the expanse of unoccupied land, or the free field outside the towns and villages (cf. בּר, Arab. barrytt) (Fl.), vid., Job 5:10; Job 18:17 (where we have translated "in the steppe far and wide"); and regarding the fundamental idea, vid., above at Pro 5:16. Synonymous with ארץ, as contrast to חוצות, is תּבל, which like יבוּל (produce, wealth) comes from יבל, and thus denotes the earth as fruit-bearing (as אדמה properly denotes the humus as the covering of earth). Accordingly, with Ewald, we may understand by ראשׁ עפרות, "the heaps of the many clods of the fertile arable land lying as if scattered on the plains." Hitzig also translates: "the first clods of the earth." We do not deny that עפרות may mean clods of earth, i.e., pieces of earth gathered together, as Job 28:6, עפרת זהב, gold ore, i.e., pieces of earth or ore containing gold. But for clods of earth the Heb. language has the nouns רגב and מגרפה; and if we read together עפרות, plur. of the collective עפר (dust as a mass), which comes as from a n. unitatis עפרה, and ראשׁ, which, among its meanings in poetry as well as in prose, has also that of the sum, i.e., the chief amount or the total amount (cf. the Arab. râs âlmâl, the capital, τὸ κεφάλαιον), then the two words in their mutual relation yield the sense of the sum of the several parts of the dust, as of the atoms of dust (Cocceius; Schultens, summam pluverum orbis habitabilis); and Fleischer rightly remarks that other interpretations, as ab initio pulveris orbis, praecipus quaeque orbis terrarum, caput orbis terrarum (i.e., according to Rashi, the first man; according to Umbreit, man generally), leave the choice of the plur. עפרות unintelligible. Before these creatures originated, Wisdom was, as she herself says, and emphatically repeats, already born; חוללתּי is the passive of the Pilel חולל, which means to whirl, to twist oneself, to bring forth with sorrow (Aquila, Theodotion, ὠδινήθην; Graec. Venet. 24a, πέπλασμαι, 25b, ὠδίνημαι), then but poet. generally to beget, to bring forth (Pro 25:23; Pro 26:10). |
| Explanatory Notes on the Whole Bible, by John Wesley [1754-65] |
| No depths - No abyss or deep waters. Brought forth - Begotten of my father. |
| Adam Clarke Commentary on the Whole Bible - Published 1810-1826 |
When there were no depths - תהמות tehomoth, before the original chaotic mass was formed. See Gen 1:2.
I was brought forth - חוללתי cholalti, "I was produced as by laboring throes." Mr. Parkhurst thinks that the heathen poets derived their idea of Minerva's (wisdom's) being born of Jupiter's brain, from some such high poetic personification as that in the text. |
2 Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God.
1 But Job answered and said,
2 How hast thou helped him that is without power? how savest thou the arm that hath no strength?
3 How hast thou counseled him that hath no wisdom? and how hast thou abundantly declared the thing as it is?
4 To whom hast thou uttered words? and whose spirit came from thee?
5 Dead things are formed from under the waters, and the inhabitants thereof.
6 Hell is naked before him, and destruction hath no covering.
7 He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing.
8 He bindeth up the waters in his thick clouds; and the cloud is not rent under them.
9 He holdeth back the face of his throne, and spreadeth his cloud upon it.
10 He hath encompassed the waters with bounds, until the day and night come to an end.
11 The pillars of heaven tremble and are astonished at his reproof.
12 He divideth the sea by his power, and by his understanding he smiteth through the proud.
13 By his spirit he hath garnished the heavens; his hand hath formed the crooked serpent.
14 Lo, these are parts of his ways: but how little a portion is heard of him? but the thunder of his power who can understand?
10 The great God that formed all things both rewardeth the fool, and rewardeth transgressors.
23 The north wind driveth away rain: so doth an angry countenance a backbiting tongue.
6 The stones of it are the place of sapphires: and it hath dust of gold.
16 Let thy fountains be dispersed abroad, and rivers of waters in the streets.
17 His remembrance shall perish from the earth, and he shall have no name in the street.
10 Who giveth rain upon the earth, and sendeth waters upon the fields:
26 While as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust of the world.
9 And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered into one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
8 They go up by the mountains; they go down by the valleys to the place which thou hast founded for them.
6 Upon what are the foundations of it fastened? or who laid its corner stone;
26 While as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust of the world.
5 And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain on the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground.
25 Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth.
21 His sons come to honor, and he knoweth it not; and they are brought low, but he perceiveth it not of them.
2 And Abram was very rich in cattle, in silver, and in gold.
8 Who hath taken this counsel against Tyre, the crowning city, whose merchants are princes, whose traders are the honorable of the earth?
9 The LORD of hosts hath purposed it, to stain the pride of all glory, and to bring into contempt all the honorable of the earth.
16 Let thy fountains be dispersed abroad, and rivers of waters in the streets.
25 Even by the God of thy father, who shall help thee, and by the Almighty, who shall bless thee with blessings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lieth beneath, blessings of the breasts, and of the womb:
11 In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.
7 And the angel of the LORD found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness, by the fountain in the way to Shur.
16 Hast thou entered into the springs of the sea? or hast thou walked in the search of the depth?
20 By his knowledge the depths are broken up, and the clouds drop down the dew.
2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep: and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.