Text -- Ecclesiastes 7:26-29 (NET)

7:26 I discovered this: More bitter than death is the kind of woman who is like a hunter’s snare; her heart is like a hunter’s net and her hands are like prison chains. The man who pleases God escapes her, but the sinner is captured by her. 7:27 The Teacher says: I discovered this while trying to discover the scheme of things, item by item. 7:28 What I have continually sought, I have not found; I have found only one upright man among a thousand, but I have not found one upright woman among all of them. 7:29 This alone have I discovered: God made humankind upright, but they have sought many evil schemes.

Commentary -- Verse Notes / Footnotes

NET Notes: Ecc 7:26

¹ tn The word “this” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for smoothness.

² tn The phrase “kind of” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for clarity (see the following note on the word “woman”).

³ tn The article on הָאִשָּׁה (ha’ishah) functions in a particularizing sense (“the kind of woman”) rather than in a generic sense (i.e., “women”).

⁴ tn Heb “is snares.” The plural form מְצוֹדִים (mÿtsodim, from the noun I מָצוֹד, matsod, “snare”) is used to connote either intensity, repeated or habitual action, or moral characteristic. For the function of the Hebrew plural, see IBHS 120-21 §7.4.2. The term II מָצוֹד “snare” is used in a concrete sense in reference to the hunter’s snare or net, but in a figurative sense of being ensnared by someone (Job 19:6; Prov 12:12; Eccl 7:26).

NET Notes: Ecc 7:28

¹ tn The word “only” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for smoothness.

² tn The word “upright” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation twice, here and in the following line, for clarity.