Proverbs 15:19

15:19 The way of the sluggard is like a hedge of thorns, ¹ 

but the path of the upright is like ²  a highway. ³ 

Proverbs 19:15

19:15 Laziness brings on ⁴  a deep sleep, ⁵ 

and the idle person ⁶  will go hungry. ⁷ 

Proverbs 22:13

22:13 The sluggard says, “There is a lion ⁸  outside!

I will be killed in the middle of the streets!” ⁹ 

[15:19]  ¹ tn Heb “like an overgrowth”; NRSV “overgrown with thorns”; cf. CEV “like walking in a thorn patch.” The point of the simile is that the path of life taken by the lazy person has many obstacles that are painful – it is like trying to break through a hedge of thorns. The LXX has “strewn with thorns.”

[15:19]  ² 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.

[15:19]  ³ sn The contrast to the “thorny way” is the highway, the Hebrew word signifying a well built-up road (סָלַל, salal, “to heap up”). The upright have no reason to swerve, duck, or detour, but may expect “clear sailing.” Other passages pair these two concepts, e.g., Prov 6:10; 10:26; 28:19.

[19:15]  ⁴ tn Heb “causes to fall” or “casts”; NAB “plunges…into.”

[19:15]  ⁵ tn Or “complete inactivity”; the word תַּרְדֵּמָה (tardemah) can refer to a physical “deep sleep” (e.g., Gen 2:21; Jonah 1:5, 6); but it can also be used figuratively for complete inactivity, as other words for “sleep” can. Here it refers to lethargy or debility and morbidness.

[19:15]  ⁶ tn The expression וְנֶפֶשׁ רְמִיָּה (vÿnefesh rÿmiyyah) can be translated “the soul of deceit” or “the soul of slackness.” There are two identical feminine nouns, one from the verb “beguile,” and the other from a cognate Arabic root “grow loose.” The second is more likely here in view of the parallelism (cf. NIV “a shiftless man”; NAB “the sluggard”). One who is slack, that is, idle, will go hungry.

[19:15]  ⁷ sn The two lines are related in a metonymical sense: “deep sleep” is the cause of going hungry, and “going hungry” is the effect of deep sleep.

[22:13]  ⁸ sn The proverb humorously describes the sluggard as making ridiculous excuses for not working – he might be eaten by a lion (e.g., 26:13). It is possible that “lion” is figurative, intended to represent someone who is like a lion, but this detracts from the humor of the exaggeration.

[22:13]  ⁹ tc The LXX changes the phrase to read “murderers in the street” to form a better parallelism, possibly because the verb רָצַח (ratsakh) is used only of humans, not wild animals. The NIV attempts to solve the problem by making the second line a separate claim by the sluggard: “or, ‘I will be murdered in the streets!’”