16:18 Pride 1 goes 2 before destruction,
and a haughty spirit before a fall. 3
16:5 The Lord abhors 4 every arrogant person; 5
rest assured 6 that they will not go unpunished. 7
1 sn The two lines of this proverb are synonymous parallelism, and so there are parasynonyms. “Pride” is paired with “haughty spirit” (“spirit” being a genitive of specification); and “destruction” is matched with “a tottering, falling.”
2 tn Heb “[is] before destruction.”
3 sn Many proverbs have been written in a similar way to warn against the inevitable disintegration and downfall of pride. W. McKane records an Arabic proverb: “The nose is in the heavens, the seat is in the mire” (Proverbs [OTL], 490).
4 tn Heb “an abomination of the
5 tn Heb “every proud of heart”; NIV “all the proud of heart.” “Heart” is the genitive of specification; the phrase is talking about people who have proud hearts, whose ideas are arrogant. These are people who set themselves presumptuously against God (e.g., 2 Chr 26:16; Ps 131:1; Prov 18:12).
6 tn Heb “hand to hand.” This idiom means “you can be assured” (e.g., Prov 11:21).
7 tc The LXX has inserted two couplets here: “The beginning of a good way is to do justly, // and it is more acceptable with God than to do sacrifices; // he who seeks the