Provérbios 19:25 Comentário

Here see, 1. What will be the credit and comfort of a poor man, and make him more excellent than his neighbour, though his poverty may expose him to contempt and may dispirit him. Let him be honest and walk in integrity, let him keep a good conscience and make it appear that he does so, let him always speak and act with sincerity when he is under the greatest temptations to dissemble and break his word, and then let him value himself upon that, for all wise and good men will value him. He is better, has a better character, is in a better condition, is better beloved, and lives to better purpose, than many a one that looks great and makes a figure. 2. What will be the shame of a rich man, notwithstanding all his pomp. If he have a shallow head and an evil tongue, if he is perverse in his lips and is a fool, if he is a wicked man and gets what he has by fraud and oppression, he is a fool, and an honest poor man is to be preferred far before him.

Note, 1. The punishment of scorners will be a means of good to others. When men are so hardened in wickedness that they will not themselves be wrought upon by the severe methods that are used to reclaim and reform them, yet such methods must be used for the sake of others, that they may hear and fear, Deu 19:20. If the scorner will not be recovered from his sin, the disease being inveterate, yet the simple will beware of venturing upon the sin which exposes men thus. If it cure not the infected, it may prevent the spreading of the infection. 2. The reproof of wise men will be a means of good to themselves. They need not be smitten; a word to the wise is enough. Do but reprove one that has understanding and he will so far understand himself and his own interest that he will understand knowledge by it, and not miss it again through ignorance and inadvertency when once he has been told of it; so kindly does he take reproof and so wisely improve it.

Better is the poor that walketh in his integrity,.... In the uprightness of his heart before God and men; who is sincere in the worship of God, and in the profession of his name, and walks in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless; and is upright, harmless, and inoffensive in his conversation with men; and studies to exercise a conscience void of offence to both, and continues herein. A man may be a poor man with respect to worldly things, and yet be rich towards God; may be a truly gracious good man, honest, sincere, and upright in heart and life: and such an one is better than he that is perverse in his lips, and is a fool; that is, than a rich man, as the Syriac and Vulgate Latin versions supply it, and as the antithesis requires; "that is perverse in his lips", or "whose ways are perverse", as the Syriac version; that acts the deceitful part both by words and actions towards those that are about him, not being honest and plain hearted as the poor man is; and who uses those beneath him very roughly; and concerning oppression speaks loftily, and lets his tongue run both against God in heaven and man on earth, by which he shows he is a fool: for his riches do not give him wisdom; and his words and actions declare he wants it; men may be poor, and yet wise; and a matt may be rich, and yet a fool: or is confident (d); that is, trusts in his riches, and is opposed to a poor man, so R. Saadiah Gaon. This verse and Pro 19:2 are not in the Septuagint and Arabic versions. (d) "confidens divitiis", Cocceii Lexic. col. 384.

Smite a scorner, and the simple will beware,.... That is, give reproof to a man that scoffs at religion, and makes a jest of all that is good; for though it may be of no use to him who will despise it, yet it may be observed, and be useful to another that hears it; who, though void of understanding, yet not hardened in impiety as the other, but open to conviction, "will become cunning" (x), as it may be rendered; or learns wisdom, and becomes hereby a knowing and understanding man; he hears another reproved, and fears, and becomes a wise man; so that though reproof may be lost on one, it succeeds in another, which is an encouragement to give it; and reprove one that hath understanding, and he will understand knowledge; he will grow wiser and wiser; he will improve in the knowledge of things; see Pro 9:8. (x) "astutus efficetur", Pagninus, Montanus; "astutus fiet", Junius & Tremellius, Cocceius; "astutior fiet", Michaelis; "solertiam parabit", Schultens.

If you want to take Scripture as a witness that sinners are punished for the education of others, even if those unabashed may be beyond treatment, hear Solomon in the Proverbs who says, “When a pest is being whipped, the fool will be more astute.” He did not say that he who is being whipped will be more astute and more sensible through the whips, but he said that the fool will change from foolishness into common sense through whips employed on the pest. For this is signified here by the term astute, and the fool changes because he sees others who are whipped. Hence the punishment of others is useful for us if we learn greater readiness for salvation through others who are punished.

(Pro. 19:1-29) (Compare Pro 28:6). "Rich" for fool here. Integrity is better than riches (Pro 15:16-17; Pro 16:8).

Such is the benefit of reproof; even the simple profit, much more the wise.

25 The scorner thou smitest, and the simple is prudent; And if one reprove the man of understanding, he gaineth knowledge Hitzig translates in a way that is syntactically inexact: smite the scorner, so the simple becomes prudent; that would have required at least the word ויערם: fut. and fut. connected by ו is one of many modes of expression for the simultaneous, discussed by me at Hab 3:10. The meaning of the proverb has a complete commentary at Pro 21:11, where its two parts are otherwise expressed with perfect identity of thought. In regard to the לץ, with whom denunciation and threatening bear no fruit (Pro 13:1; Pro 15:12), and perhaps even produce the contrary effect to that intended (Pro 9:7), there remains nothing else than to vindicate the injured truths by means of the private justice of corporal punishment. Such words, if spoken to the right man, in the right spirit, at the right time, may affect him with wholesome terrors; but even though he is not made better thereby, yet the simple, who listens to the mockeries of such not without injury, will thereby become prudent (gain הערים = ערמה, prudence, as at Pro 15:5), i.e., either arrive at the knowledge that the mockery of religion is wicked, or guard himself against incurring the same repressive measures. In 25b והוכח is neither inf. (Umbreit), which after Pro 21:11 must be וּבהוכח, nor impr. (Targ., Ewald), which according to rule is הוכח, but the hypothetic perf. (Syr.) with the most general subject (Merc., Hitzig): if one impart instruction to the (dat. obj. as Pro 9:7; Pro 15:2) man of understanding (vid., Pro 16:21), then he acquires knowledge, i.e., gains an insight into the nature and value of that which one wishes to bring him to the knowledge of (הבין דּעת, as Pro 29:7; cf. Pro 8:5). That which the deterring lesson of exemplary punishment approximately effects with the wavering, is, in the case of the man of understanding, perfectly attained by an instructive word. We have now reached the close of the third chief section of the older Book of Proverbs. All the three sections begin with בּן חכם, Pro 10:1; Pro 13:1; Pro 15:20. The Introduction, chap. 1-9, dedicates this collection of Solomonic proverbs to youth, and the three beginnings accordingly relate to the relative duties of a son to his father and mother. We are now no longer far from the end, for Pro 22:17 resumes the tone of the Introduction. The third principal part would be disproportionately large if it extended from Pro 15:1 to Pro 22:15. But there does not again occur a proverb beginning with the words "son of man." We can therefore scarcely go wrong if we take Pro 19:26 as the commencement of a fourth principal part. The Masora divides the whole Mishle into eight sedarim, which exhibit so little knowledge of the true division, that the parashas (sections) Pro 10:1; Pro 22:17 do not at all find their right place. (Note: The 915 verses of the Mishle, according to the Masora, fall into eight sedarim, beginning as follows: Pro 1:1; Pro 5:18; Pro 9:12; Pro 14:4; Pro 18:10; Pro 22:22; Pro 25:13; Pro 28:16.) The MSS, however, contain evidences that this Hagiograph was also anciently divided into parashas, which were designated partly by spaces between the lines (sethumoth) and partly by breaks in the lines (phethucoth). In Baer's Cod. Jamanensis, (Note: Vid., the Prefatio to the Masoretico-Critical Edition of Isaiah by Baer and myself; Leipzig, 1872.) after Pro 6:19, there is the letter פ written on the margin as the mark of such a break. With Pro 6:20 (vid., l.c.) there indeed commences a new part of the introductory Mashal discourses. But, besides, we only seldom meet with (Note: There are spaces within the lines after Pro 1:7, Pro 1:9, Pro 1:33; Pro 2:22; Pro 3:18, Pro 3:35; Pro 5:17, Pro 5:23; Pro 6:4, Pro 6:11, Pro 6:15, Pro 6:19 (here a פ), Pro 6:35, Pro 8:21, Pro 8:31, Pro 8:35; Pro 9:18; Pro 17:25; Pro 18:9; Pro 22:19, Pro 22:27; Pro 23:14; Pro 24:22, Pro 24:33; Pro 26:21; Pro 28:10, Pro 28:16; Pro 29:17, Pro 29:27; Pro 30:6, Pro 30:9, Pro 30:14, Pro 30:17, Pro 30:20, Pro 30:24, Pro 30:28, Pro 30:33; Pro 31:9.) coincidences with the division and grouping which have commended themselves to us. In the MS of the Graecus Venetus, Pro 19:11, Pro 19:16, and Pro 19:19 have their initial letters coloured red; but why only these verses, is not manifest. A comparison of the series of proverbs distinguished by such initials with the Cod. Jaman. and Cod. II of the Leipzig City Library, makes it more than probable that it gives a traditional division of the Mishle, which may perhaps yet be discovered by a comparison of MSS. (Note: Vid., Gebhardt's Prolegomena to his new edition of the Versio Veneta.) But this much is clear, that a historico-literary reconstruction of the Mishle, and of its several parts, can derive no help from this comparison.