18:21 Death and life are in the power 1 of the tongue, 2
and those who love its use 3 will eat its fruit.
26:6 Like cutting off the feet or drinking violence, 4
so is sending 5 a message by the hand of a fool. 6
26:9 Like a thorn 7 that goes into the hand of a drunkard,
so is a proverb in the mouth of a fool. 8
17:16 Of what 9 use is money in the hand of a fool, 10
since he has no intention 11 of acquiring wisdom? 12
21:1 The king’s heart 13 is in the hand 14 of the Lord like channels of water; 15
he turns it wherever he wants.
1 tn Heb “in the hand of.”
2 sn What people say can lead to life or death. The Midrash on Psalms shows one way the tongue [what is said] can cause death: “The evil tongue slays three, the slanderer, the slandered, and the listener” (Midrash Tehillim 52:2). See J. G. Williams, “The Power of Form: A Study of Biblical Proverbs,” Semeia 17 (1980): 35-38.
3 tn The referent of “it” must be the tongue, i.e., what the tongue says (= “its use”). So those who enjoy talking, indulging in it, must “eat” its fruit, whether good or bad. The expression “eating the fruit” is an implied comparison; it means accept the consequences of loving to talk (cf. TEV).
4 sn Sending a messenger on a mission is like having another pair of feet. But if the messenger is a fool, this proverb says, not only does the sender not have an extra pair of feet – he cuts off the pair he has. It would not be simply that the message did not get through; it would get through incorrectly and be a setback! The other simile uses “violence,” a term for violent social wrongs and injustice. The metaphorical idea of “drinking” violence means suffering violence – it is one’s portion. So sending a fool on a mission will have injurious consequences.
5 tn The participle could be taken as the subject of the sentence: “the one who sends…cuts off…and drinks.”
6 sn The consequence is given in the first line and the cause in the second. It would be better not to send a message at all than to use a fool as messenger.
7 sn The picture is one of seizing a thornbush and having the thorn pierce the hand (עָלָה בְיַד־, ’alah vÿyad). A drunk does not know how to handle a thornbush because he cannot control his movements and so gets hurt (W. McKane, Proverbs [OTL], 599). C. H. Toy suggests that this rather means a half-crazy drunken man brandishing a stick (Proverbs [ICC], 475). In this regard cf. NLT “a thornbush brandished by a drunkard.”
8 sn A fool can read or speak a proverb but will be intellectually and spiritually unable to handle it; he will misapply it or misuse it in some way. In doing so he will reveal more of his folly. It is painful to hear fools try to use proverbs.
10 tn Heb “why this?” The term זֶּה (zeh) is an enclitic use of the demonstrative pronoun for emphasis: “why ever” would this happen?
11 sn The sense seems to be “What good is money” since what the fool needs cannot be bought? The verse is a rhetorical question stating that money would be wasted on a fool.
12 tn Heb “there is no heart”; NASB “he has no (+ common TEV) sense”; NLT “has no heart for wisdom.”
13 sn W. McKane envisions a situation where the fool comes to a sage with a fee in hand, supposing that he can acquire a career as a sage, and this gives rise to the biting comment here: Why does the fool have money in his hands? To buy wisdom when he has no brains? (Proverbs [OTL], 505).
13 sn “Heart” is a metonymy of subject; it signifies the ability to make decisions, if not the decisions themselves.
14 sn “Hand” in this passage is a personification; the word is frequently used idiomatically for “power,” and that is the sense intended here.
15 tn “Channels of water” (פַּלְגֵי, palge) is an adverbial accusative, functioning as a figure of comparison – “like channels of water.” Cf. NAB “Like a stream”; NIV “watercourse”; NRSV, NLT “a stream of water.”