Proverbs 11:12

11:12 The one who denounces ¹  his neighbor lacks wisdom, ² 

but the one who has discernment ³  keeps silent. ⁴ 

Proverbs 17:5

17:5 The one who mocks the poor ⁵  insults ⁶  his Creator;

whoever rejoices over disaster will not go unpunished.

Proverbs 18:3

18:3 When a wicked person ⁷  arrives, contempt ⁸  shows up with him,

and with shame comes ⁹  a reproach.

Job 31:13-15

31:13 “If I have disregarded the right of my male servants

or my female servants

when they disputed ¹⁰  with me,

31:14 then what will I do when God confronts me in judgment; ¹¹ 

when he intervenes, ¹² 

how will I respond to him?

31:15 Did not the one who made me in the womb make them? ¹³ 

Did not the same one form us in the womb?

Job 35:5-6

35:5 Gaze at the heavens and see;

consider the clouds, which are higher than you! ¹⁴ 

35:6 If you sin, how does it affect God? ¹⁵ 

If your transgressions are many,

what does it do to him? ¹⁶ 

Psalms 22:24

22:24 For he did not despise or detest the suffering ¹⁷  of the oppressed; ¹⁸ 

he did not ignore him; ¹⁹ 

when he cried out to him, he responded. ²⁰ 

Luke 18:9

The Parable of the Pharisee and Tax Collector

18:9 Jesus ²¹  also told this parable to some who were confident that they were righteous and looked down ²²  on everyone else.

James 2:5-6

2:5 Listen, my dear brothers and sisters! ²³  Did not God choose the poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom that he promised to those who love him? 2:6 But you have dishonored the poor! ²⁴  Are not the rich oppressing you and dragging you into the courts?

James 2:14-16

Faith and Works Together

2:14 What good is it, my brothers and sisters, ²⁵  if someone claims to have faith but does not have works? Can this kind of faith ²⁶  save him? ²⁷  2:15 If a brother or sister ²⁸  is poorly clothed and lacks daily food, 2:16 and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, keep warm and eat well,” but you do not give them what the body needs, ²⁹  what good is it?

[11:12]  ¹ tn Heb “despises” (so NASB) or “belittles” (so NRSV). The participle בָּז (baz, from בּוּז, buz) means “to despise; to show contempt for” someone. It reflects an attitude of pride and judgmentalism. In view of the parallel line, in this situation it would reflect perhaps some public denunciation of another person.

[11:12]  ² tn Heb “heart.” The noun לֵב (lev, “heart”) functions as a metonymy of association for wisdom, since the heart is often associated with knowledge and wisdom (BDB 524 s.v. 3.a).

[11:12]  ³ tn Heb “a man of discernment.”

[11:12]  ⁴ sn The verb translated “keeps silence” (יַחֲרִישׁ, yakharish) means “holds his peace.” Rather than publicly denouncing another person’s mistake or folly, a wise person will keep quiet about it (e.g., 1 Sam 10:27). A discerning person realizes that the neighbor may become an opponent and someday retaliate.

[17:5]  ⁵ sn The parallelism helps define the subject matter: The one who “mocks the poor” (NAB, NASB, NIV) is probably one who “rejoices [NIV gloats] over disaster.” The poverty is hereby explained as a disaster that came to some. The topic of the parable is the person who mocks others by making fun of their misfortune.

[17:5]  ⁶ sn The Hebrew word translated “insults” (חֵרֵף, kheref) means “reproach; taunt” (as with a cutting taunt); it describes words that show contempt for or insult God. The idea of reproaching the Creator may be mistaking and blaming God’s providential control of the world (C. H. Toy, Proverbs [ICC], 337). W. G. Plaut, however, suggests that mocking the poor means holding up their poverty as a personal failure and thus offending their dignity and their divine nature (Proverbs, 187).

[18:3]  ⁷ tc The MT has “a wicked [person].” Many commentators emend the text to רֶשַׁע (resha’, “wickedness”) which makes better parallelism with “shame” (W. McKane, Proverbs [OTL], 521; R. B. Y. Scott, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes [AB], 112; C. H. Toy, Proverbs [ICC], 355; cf. NAB, NIV, NRSV). However, there is no external evidence for this emendation.

[18:3]  ⁸ sn “Contempt” (בּוּז, buz) accompanies the wicked; “reproach” (חֶרְפָּה, kherpah) goes with shame. This reproach refers to the critical rebukes and taunts of the community against a wicked person.

[18:3]  ⁹ tn The term “comes” does not appear in the Hebrew but is supplied in the translation for the sake of clarity and smoothness.

[31:13]  ¹⁰ tn This construction is an adverbial clause using the temporal preposition, the infinitive from רִיב (riv, “contend”), and the suffix which is the subjective genitive.

[31:14]  ¹¹ tn Heb “arises.” The LXX reads “takes vengeance,” an interpretation that is somewhat correct but unnecessary. The verb “to rise” would mean “to confront in judgment.”

[31:14]  ¹² tn The verb פָקַד (paqad) means “to visit,” but with God as the subject it means any divine intervention for blessing or cursing, anything God does that changes a person’s life. Here it is “visit to judge.”

[31:15]  ¹³ tn Heb “him,” but the plural pronoun has been used in the translation to indicate that the referent is the servants mentioned in v. 13 (since the previous “him” in v. 14 refers to God).

[35:5]  ¹⁴ tn The preposition is taken here as a comparative min (מִן). The line could also read “that are high above you.” This idea has appeared in the speech of Eliphaz (22:12), Zophar (11:7ff.), and even Job (9:8ff.).

[35:6]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “him” (also in v. 7); the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[35:6]  ¹⁶ tn See Job 7:20.

[22:24]  ¹⁷ tn Or “affliction”; or “need.”

[22:24]  ¹⁸ sn In this verse the psalmist refers to himself in the third person and characterizes himself as oppressed.

[22:24]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “he did not hide his face from him.” For other uses of the idiom “hide the face” meaning “ignore,” see Pss 10:11; 13:1; 51:9. Sometimes the idiom carries the stronger idea of “reject” (see Pss 27:9; 88:14).

[22:24]  ²⁰ tn Heb “heard.”

[18:9]  ²¹ tn Grk “He”; the referent has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[18:9]  ²² tn Grk “and despised.” This is a second parable with an explanatory introduction.

[2:5]  ²³ tn Grk “brothers.” See note on the phrase “brothers and sisters” in 1:2.

[2:6]  ²⁴ tn This is singular: “the poor person,” perhaps referring to the hypothetical one described in vv. 2-3.

[2:14]  ²⁵ tn Grk “brothers.” See note on the phrase “brothers and sisters” in 1:2.

[2:14]  ²⁶ tn Grk “the faith,” referring to the kind of faith just described: faith without works. The article here is anaphoric, referring to the previous mention of the noun πίστις (pisti") in the verse. See ExSyn 219.

[2:14]  ²⁷ sn The form of the question in Greek expects a negative answer.

[2:15]  ²⁸ tn It is important to note that the words ἀδελφός (adelfos) and ἀδελφή (adelfh) both occur in the Greek text at this point, confirming that the author intended to refer to both men and women. See the note on “someone” in 2:2.

[2:16]  ²⁹ tn Grk “what is necessary for the body.”