Proverbs 10:7

10:7 The memory ¹  of the righteous is a blessing,

but the reputation ²  of the wicked will rot. ³ 

Proverbs 18:10

18:10 The name of the Lord ⁴  is like ⁵  a strong tower; ⁶ 

the righteous person runs ⁷  to it and is set safely on high. ⁸ 

Proverbs 21:24

21:24 A proud ⁹  and arrogant ¹⁰  person, whose name is “Scoffer,” ¹¹ 

acts ¹²  with overbearing pride. ¹³ 

Proverbs 22:1

22:1 A good name ¹⁴  is to be chosen ¹⁵  rather than great wealth,

good favor ¹⁶  more than silver or gold.

Proverbs 30:9

30:9 lest I become satisfied and act deceptively ¹⁷ 

and say, “Who is the Lord?”

Or lest I become poor and steal

and demean ¹⁸  the name of my God.

Proverbs 30:4

30:4 Who has ascended into heaven, and then descended? ¹⁹ 

Who has gathered up the winds in his fists? ²⁰ 

Who has bound up the waters in his cloak? ²¹ 

Who has established all the ends of the earth? ²² 

What is his name, and what is his son’s name? ²³  – if you know!

[10:7]  ¹ sn “Memory” (זֵכֶר, zekher) and “name” are often paired as synonyms. “Memory” in this sense has to do with reputation, fame. One’s reputation will be good or bad by righteousness or wickedness respectively.

[10:7]  ² tn Heb “name.” The term “name” often functions as a metonymy of association for reputation (BDB 1028 s.v. שֵׁם 2.b).

[10:7]  ³ tn The editors of BHS suggest a reading “will be cursed” to make a better parallelism, but the reading of the MT is more striking as a metaphor.

[18:10]  ⁴ sn The “name of the Lord” is a metonymy of subject. The “name” here signifies not the personal name “Yahweh,” for that would be redundant in the expression “the name of Yahweh,” but the attributes of the Lord (cf. Exod 34:5-7) – here his power to protect.

[18:10]  ⁵ tn The comparative “like” does not appear in the Hebrew text, but is implied by the metaphor; it is supplied for the sake of clarity.

[18:10]  ⁶ tn Heb “a tower of strength,” with “strength” regarded as attributive by most English versions. The metaphor “strong tower” indicates that God is a secure refuge. The figure is qualified in the second colon.

[18:10]  ⁷ sn The metaphor of “running” to the Lord refers to a whole-hearted and unwavering trust in God’s protection (e.g., Isa 40:31).

[18:10]  ⁸ tn Heb “is high” or “is inaccessible.” This military-type expression stresses the effect of the trust – security, being out of danger (see HALOT 1305 s.v. שׂגב). Other scriptures will supply the ways that God actually protects people who trust him.

[21:24]  ⁷ tn The word זֵד (zed, “proud”) comes from the verb זִיד (zid, “to boil up; to seethe; to act proudly [or, presumptuously].” Just as water boiling up in a pot will boil over, so the presumptuous person “oversteps” the boundaries.

[21:24]  ⁸ tn The word יָהִיר (yahir) means “haughty,” that is, to be or show oneself to be presumptuous or arrogant.

[21:24]  ⁹ tn Heb “proud haughty scorner his name” (KJV similar). There are several ways that the line could be translated: (1) “Proud, arrogant – his name is scoffer” or (2) “A proud person, an arrogant person – ‘Scoffer’ is his name.” BDB 267 s.v. זֵד suggests, “A presumptuous man, [who is] haughty, scoffer is his name.”

[21:24]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “does.” The Qal active participle “does” serves as the main verb, and the subject is “proud person” in the first line.

[21:24]  ¹¹ tn The expression בְּעֶבְרַת זָדוֹן (be’evrat zadon) means “in the overflow of insolence.” The genitive specifies what the overflow is; the proud deal in an overflow of pride. Cf. NIV “overweening pride”; NLT “boundless arrogance.”

[22:1]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “a name.” The idea of the name being “good” is implied; it has the connotation here of a reputation (cf. TEV, CEV, NLT).

[22:1]  ¹¹ tn “To be chosen rather than” is a translation of the Niphal participle with the comparative degree taken into consideration. Cf. CEV “worth much more than.”

[22:1]  ¹² tn Heb “favor of goodness.” This is a somewhat difficult expression. Some English versions render the phrase “favor is better than silver or gold” (so NASB, NRSV) making it parallel to the first colon. But if “good” is retained as an attributive modifier, then it would mean one was well thought of, or one had engaging qualities (cf. ASV “loving favor; NLT “high esteem”). This fits with the idea of the reputation in the first colon, for a good name would bring with it the favor of others.

[30:9]  ¹³ tn The verb כָּחַשׁ (kakhash) means “to be disappointing; to deceive; to fail; to grow lean.” In the Piel stem it means “to deceive; to act deceptively; to cringe; to disappoint.” The idea of acting deceptively is illustrated in Hos 9:2 where it has the connotation of “disowning” or “refusing to acknowledge” (a meaning very close to its meaning here).

[30:9]  ¹⁴ tn The Hebrew verb literally means “to take hold of; to seize”; this produces the idea of doing violence to the reputation of God.

[30:4]  ¹⁶ sn To make his point Agur includes five questions. These, like Job 38–41, or Proverbs 8:24-29, focus on the divine acts to show that it is absurd for a mere mortal to think that he can explain God’s work or compare himself to God. These questions display mankind’s limitations and God’s incomparable nature. The first question could be open to include humans, but may refer to God alone (as the other questions do).

[30:4]  ¹⁷ sn The questions are filled with anthropomorphic language. The questioner is asking what humans have ever done this, but the meaning is that only God has done this. “Gathering the wind in his fists” is a way of expressing absolute sovereign control over the forces of nature.

[30:4]  ¹⁸ sn The question is comparing the clouds of the heavens to garments (e.g., Job 26:8). T. T. Perowne writes, “Men bind up water in skins or bottles; God binds up the rain-floods in the thin, gauzy texture of the changing clouds, which yet by his power does not rend under its burden of waters.”

[30:4]  ¹⁹ sn The ends of the earth is an expression often used in scripture as a metonymy of subject referring to the people who live in the ends of the earth, the far off and remote lands and islands. While that is possible here as well, this may simply be a synecdoche saying that God created the whole world, even the most remote and distant places.

[30:4]  ²⁰ sn The reference to “son” in this passage has prompted many suggestions down through the years: It was identified as Israel in the Jewish Midrashim, the Logos or demiurge by some of the philosophers and allegorical writers, as simple poetic parallelism without a separate identity by some critical scholars, and as Jesus by Christian commentators. Parallels with Ugaritic are interesting, because Baal is referred to as a son; but that is bound up within the pantheon where there was a father god. Some of the Jewish commentators exhibit a strange logic in expressing what Christians would say is only their blindness to the full revelation: There is little cogency in this being a reference to Jesus because if there had been such a person at any time in the past he would have left some tradition about it through his descendants (J. H. Greenstone, Proverbs, 317). But Judaism has taught from the earliest times that Messiah was preexistent (especially in view of Micah 5 and Daniel 7); and the claims of Jesus in the Gospels bear this out. It seems best to say that there is a hint here of the nature of the Messiah as Son, a hint that will later be revealed in full through the incarnation.