Proverbs 28:26

28:26 The one who trusts in his own heart ¹  is a fool,

but the one who walks in wisdom ²  will escape. ³ 

Isaiah 44:20

44:20 He feeds on ashes; ⁴ 

his deceived mind misleads him.

He cannot rescue himself,

nor does he say, ‘Is this not a false god I hold in my right hand?’ ⁵ 

Obadiah 1:3

1:3 Your presumptuous heart ⁶  has deceived you –

you who reside in the safety of the rocky cliffs, ⁷ 

whose home is high in the mountains. ⁸ 

You think to yourself, ⁹ 

‘No one can ¹⁰  bring me down to the ground!’ ¹¹ 

Romans 7:11

7:11 For sin, seizing the opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it I died. ¹² 

Ephesians 4:22

4:22 You were taught with reference to your former way of life to lay aside ¹³  the old man who is being corrupted in accordance with deceitful desires,

James 1:14

1:14 But each one is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desires.

[28:26]  ¹ sn The idea of “trusting in one’s own heart” is a way of describing one who is self-reliant. C. H. Toy says it means to follow the untrained suggestions of the mind or to rely on one’s own mental resources (Proverbs [ICC], 505). It is arrogant to take no counsel but to rely only on one’s own intelligence.

[28:26]  ² sn The idiom of “walking in wisdom” means to live life according to the acquired skill and knowledge passed on from the sages. It is the wisdom from above that the book of Proverbs presents, not the undisciplined and uninformed wit and wisdom from below.

[28:26]  ³ tn The verb form יִמָּלֵט (yimmalet) is the Niphal imperfect; the form means “to escape.” In this context one would conclude that it means “to escape from trouble,” because the one who lives in this life by wisdom will escape trouble, and the one who trusts in himself will not.

[44:20]  ⁴ tn Or perhaps, “he eats on an ash heap.”

[44:20]  ⁵ tn Heb “Is it not a lie in my right hand?”

[1:3]  ⁶ tn Heb “the presumption of your heart”; NAB, NIV “the pride of your heart”; NASB “arrogance of your heart.”

[1:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “in the concealed places of the rock”; KJV, NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV “in the clefts of the rock”; NCV “the hollow places of the cliff”; CEV “a mountain fortress.”

[1:3]  ⁸ tn Heb “on high (is) his dwelling”; NASB “in the loftiness of your dwelling place”; NRSV “whose dwelling (abode NAB) is in the heights.”

[1:3]  ⁹ tn Heb “the one who says in his heart.”

[1:3]  ¹⁰ tn The Hebrew imperfect verb used here is best understood in a modal sense (“Who can bring me down?”) rather than in the sense of a simple future (“Who will bring me down?”). So also in v. 4 (“I can bring you down”). The question is not so much whether this will happen at some time in the future, but whether it even lies in the realm of possible events. In their hubris the Edomites were boasting that no one had the capability of breaching their impregnable defenses. However, their pride caused them to fail to consider the vast capabilities of Yahweh as warrior.

[1:3]  ¹¹ tn Heb “Who can bring me down?” This rhetorical question implies a negative answer: “No one!”

[7:11]  ¹² tn Or “and through it killed me.”

[4:22]  ¹³ tn An alternative rendering for the infinitives in vv. 22-24 (“to lay aside… to be renewed… to put on”) is “that you have laid aside… that you are being renewed… that you have put on.” The three infinitives of vv. 22 (ἀποθέσθαι, apoqesqai), 23 (ἀνανεοῦσθαι, ananeousqai), and 24 (ἐνδύσασθαι, endusasqai), form part of an indirect discourse clause; they constitute the teaching given to the believers addressed in the letter. The problem in translation is that one cannot be absolutely certain whether they go back to indicatives in the original statement (i.e., “you have put off”) or imperatives (i.e., “put off!”). Every other occurrence of an aorist infinitive in indirect discourse in the NT goes back to an imperative, but in all of these examples the indirect discourse is introduced by a verb that implies a command. The verb διδάσκω (didaskw) in the corpus Paulinum may be used to relate the indicatives of the faith as well as the imperatives. This translation implies that the infinitives go back to imperatives, though the alternate view that they refer back to indicatives is also a plausible interpretation. For further discussion, see ExSyn 605.