3:32 for one who goes astray 1 is an abomination 2 to the Lord,
but he reveals 3 his intimate counsel 4 to the upright.
8:13 The fear of the Lord is to hate 5 evil;
I hate arrogant pride 6 and the evil way
and perverse utterances. 7
16:28 A perverse person 8 spreads dissension,
and a gossip separates the closest friends. 9
16:29 A violent person 10 entices 11 his neighbor,
and leads him down a path that is terrible. 12
16:30 The one who winks his eyes 13 devises perverse things,
and 14 one who compresses his lips 15 brings about 16 evil.
101:4 I will have nothing to do with a perverse person; 17
I will not permit 18 evil.
59:3 For your hands are stained with blood
and your fingers with sin;
your lips speak lies,
your tongue utters malicious words.
59:4 No one is concerned about justice; 19
no one sets forth his case truthfully.
They depend on false words 20 and tell lies;
they conceive of oppression 21
and give birth to sin.
59:5 They hatch the eggs of a poisonous snake
and spin a spider’s web.
Whoever eats their eggs will die,
a poisonous snake is hatched. 22
20:1 After the disturbance had ended, Paul sent for the disciples, and after encouraging 26 them and saying farewell, 27 he left to go to Macedonia. 28
1:1 From Paul, 29 an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,
1 tn The basic meaning of the verb לוּז (luz) is “to turn aside; to depart” (BDB 531 s.v.). The Niphal stem is always used figuratively of moral apostasy from the path of righteousness: (1) “to go astray” (Prov 2:15; 3:32; 14:2) and (2) “crookedness” in action (Isa 30:12; see HALOT 522 s.v. לוז nif; BDB 531 s.v. Niph).
2 tn Heb “abomination of the
3 tn Heb “but with the upright is his intimate counsel.” The phrase “he reveals” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for the sake of smoothness and clarity.
4 tn Heb “his counsel.” The noun סוֹד (sod) can refer to (1) “intimate circle” of friends and confidants, (2) “confidential discussion” among friends and confidants, or “secret counsel” revealed from one confidant to another and kept secret and (3) relationship of “intimacy” with a person (BDB 691 s.v.; HALOT 745 s.v.). God reveals his secret counsel to the heavenly assembly (Job 15:8; Jer 23:18, 22) and his prophets (Amos 3:7). God has brought the angels into his “intimate circle” (Ps 89:8). Likewise, those who fear the
5 tn The verb שָׂנֵא (sane’) means “to hate.” In this sentence it functions nominally as the predicate. Fearing the
6 tn Since both גֵּאָה (ge’ah, “pride”) and גָּאוֹן (ga’on, “arrogance; pride”) are both from the same verbal root גָּאָה (ga’ah, “to rise up”), they should here be interpreted as one idea, forming a nominal hendiadys: “arrogant pride.”
7 tn Heb “and a mouth of perverse things.” The word “mouth” is a metonymy of cause for what is said; and the noun תַהְפֻּכוֹת (tahpukhot, “perverse things”) means destructive things (the related verb is used for the overthrowing of Sodom).
8 tn Heb “a man of perverse things”; NAB “an intriguer.” This refers to someone who destroys lives. The parallelism suggests that he is a “slanderer” or “gossip” – one who whispers and murmurs (18:8; 26:20, 22).
9 tn The term אַלּוּף (’aluf) refers to a “friend” or “an intimate associate.” The word has other possible translations, including “tame” or “docile” when used of animals. Rashi, a Jewish scholar who lived
10 tn Heb “man of violence.” He influences his friends toward violence. The term חָמָס (khamas, “violence”) often refers to sins against society, social injustices, and crimes.
11 tn The verb in the first colon is the Piel imperfect, and the form in the second is the Hiphil perfect; the first is a habitual imperfect, and the second a gnomic perfect. The first verb, “to persuade, seduce, entice,” is the metonymy of cause; the second verb, “to lead,” is the metonymy of effect, the two together forming the whole process.
12 tn Heb “not good” (so KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV); NLT “a harmful path.” The expression “a way that is not good” is an example of tapeinosis – a deliberate understatement for the sake of emphasis: It is terrible. This refers to crime and violence. The understatement is used to warn people away from villains and to remind them to follow a good path.
13 sn The participle עֹצֶה (’otseh) describes one as shutting his eyes (cf. KJV, ASV). This could mean simply “closing the eyes,” or it could refer to “winking” (so many English versions). The proverb is saying that facial expressions often reveal if someone is plotting evil (e.g., 6:13-14).
14 tn The conjunction “and” does not appear in the Hebrew but is implied by the synonymous parallelism.
15 tn The participle קֹרֵץ (qorets) indicates that the person involved is pinching, compressing, or biting his lips (cf. NIV “purses his lips”).
16 tn The verb is a Piel perfect; it means “complete, finish, bring to an end.” The two cola may form the whole process: The first line has “to devise” evil, and the second has “he completes” evil. BDB, however, classifies this use of the Piel as “to accomplish in thought” meaning “to determine” something (BDB 478 s.v. כָּלָה 1f). In that case the two lines would have synonymous ideas, i.e., using facial expressions to plan evil actions.
17 tn Heb “a perverse heart will turn aside from me.” The adjective עִקֵּשׁ (’iqqesh) has the basic nuance “twisted; crooked” and by extension refers to someone or something that is morally perverse (see Ps 18:26). It appears frequently in the Book of Proverbs, where it is used of evil people (22:5), speech (8:8; 19:1), thoughts (11:20; 17:20), and life styles (2:15; 28:6).
18 tn Heb “know.” The king will not willingly allow perverse individuals to remain in his royal court.
19 tn Heb “no one pleads with justice.”
20 tn Heb “nothing”; NAB “emptiness.”
21 tn Or “trouble” (NIV), or “harm.”
22 tn Heb “that which is pressed in hatches [as] a snake.”
23 tn Grk “from among yourselves.”
24 tn The Greek term here is ἀνήρ (anhr), which only rarely is used in a generic sense to refer to both males and females. Since Paul is speaking to the Ephesian elders at this point and there is nothing in the context to suggest women were included in that group (“from among your own group”), it is most likely Paul was not predicting that these false teachers would include women.
25 tn Grk “speaking crooked things”; BDAG 237 s.v. διαστρέφω 2 has “λαλεῖν διεστραμμένα teach perversions (of the truth) Ac 20:30.”
26 tn Or “exhorting.”
27 tn Or “and taking leave of them.”
28 sn Macedonia was the Roman province of Macedonia in Greece.
29 tn Grk “Paul.” The word “from” is not in the Greek text, but has been supplied to indicate the sender of the letter.