Provérbios 12:1 Comentário

We are here taught to try whether we have grace or no by enquiring how we stand affected to the means of grace. 1. Those that have grace and love it will delight in all the instructions that are given them by way of counsel; admonition, or reproof, by the word or providence of God; they will value a good education, and think it not a hardship, but a happiness, to be under a strict and prudent discipline. Those that love a faithful ministry, that value it, and sit under it with pleasure, make it to appear that they love knowledge. 2. Those show themselves not only void of grace, but void of common sense, that take it as an affront to be told of their faults, and an imposition upon their liberty to be put in mind of their duty: He that hates reproof is not only foolish, but brutish, like the horse and the mule that have no understanding, or the ox that kicks against the goad. Those that desire to live in loose families and societies, where they may be under no check, that stifle the convictions of their own consciences, and count those their enemies that tell them the truth, are the brutish here meant.

Whose loveth instruction loveth knowledge,.... That loves the instruction of Wisdom, or Christ, Pro 4:13; the means of instruction, the Scriptures, which are profitable for instruction in righteousness, and are written for our learning; the Gospel, which instructs into the person, office, and grace of Christ; the ministers of the word, who are so many instructors in Christ; and even the rod of afflictions, by which men are taught their duty, and the will of God: and these are to be loved; and he that loves them clearly shows that he loves knowledge; since the means of instruction, making use of them, and getting instruction by them, are attended with labour, trouble, and difficulty; which a man would not choose, had he not a love unto and a desire after knowledge, and an increase of it; as the knowledge of God, of Christ, and of his truths. Aben Ezra inverts the words; "he that loves knowledge loves instruction;'' but the sense is much the same; but he that hateth reproof is brutish; or a "beast" (k): as the man that is willing to be instructed, in order to gain knowledge, shows himself to be a wise and understanding man; so he that hates the reproof the word of God gives, or the ministers of it, or God by them, appears to be no better than a brute, than the horse or mule that want understanding: so the man of sin hates the Scriptures, the Gospel, and the ministers of it, and the reproofs and convictions they give of his idolatry, superstition, and will worship; nor does he care that his doctrines and practices should be brought to this test, or that the people should have knowledge of them; but keeps them from them, and sets up his own infallibility as the rule of judgment; and it is one character of his followers, that they "receive not the love of the truth", Th2 2:10; and both he and they are represented by a beast, Rev 13:1; and are more brutish than any man; see Pro 5:11. (k) "instar bruti indocilis est", Michaelis.

(Pro. 12:1-28) loveth knowledge--as the fruit of instruction or training (Pro 1:2). hateth reproof-- (Pro 10:17). brutish--stupid, regardless of his own welfare (Psa 49:10; Psa 73:22).

Three proverbs on knowledge, the favour of God, firmness and the means thereto. 1 He loveth correction who loveth knowledge, And he hateth instruction who is without reason. It is difficult in such cases to say which is the relation of the ideas that is intended. The sequence of words which lies nearest in the Semitic substantival clause is that in which the predicate is placed first; but the subject may, if it is to be made prominent, stand at the head of the sentence. Here, 1b, the placing of the subject in advance recommends itself: one who hates instruction is devoid of reason. But since we have no reason in 1a to invert the order of the words as they lie together, we take the conceptions placed first in both cases as the predicates. Thus: he who loves knowledge shows and proves that he does so by this, that he willingly puts himself in the place of a learner; and devoid of reason is he who with aversion rejects reproof, which is designed to guard him from future mistakes and false steps. Regarding the punctuation דעת אהב (with Mercha on the ante-penult. and the העמדה-sign on the penult.), vid., at Pro 11:26., Pro 1:19. In 1b the Munach in תוכחת is transformed from Mugrash (Accentssystem, xviii. 2), as in Pro 15:10. בּער (cf. Pro 30:2) is a being who is stupid as the brute cattle (בּעיר, from בּער, to graze, cattle of all kinds; Arab. b'ayr, the beast κατ ̓ ἐξ., i.e., the camel); as a homo brutus is compared to a בּהמּה (Ps. 49:21), 73:22), and is called Arab. behymt, from bahym, "shut up" (spec. dabb, a bear; thwr, an ox; ḥamâr, an ass) (Fl.).