Proverbs 3:7

3:7 Do not be wise in your own estimation; ¹ 

fear the Lord and turn away from evil. ² 

Proverbs 16:6

16:6 Through loyal love and truth ³  iniquity is appeased; ⁴ 

through fearing the Lord ⁵  one avoids ⁶  evil. ⁷ 

Proverbs 16:17

16:17 The highway ⁸  of the upright is to turn ⁹  away from evil;

the one who guards ¹⁰  his way safeguards his life. ¹¹ 

Job 28:28

28:28 And he said to mankind,

‘The fear of the Lord ¹²  – that is wisdom,

and to turn away from evil is understanding.’” ¹³ 

Psalms 34:14

34:14 Turn away from evil and do what is right! ¹⁴ 

Strive for peace and promote it! ¹⁵ 

Psalms 37:27

37:27 Turn away from evil! Do what is right! ¹⁶ 

Then you will enjoy lasting security. ¹⁷ 

Psalms 37:2

37:2 For they will quickly dry up like grass,

and wither away like plants. ¹⁸ 

Psalms 2:1

Psalm 2 ¹⁹ 

2:1 Why ²⁰  do the nations rebel? ²¹ 

Why ²²  are the countries ²³  devising ²⁴  plots that will fail? ²⁵ 

[3:7]  ¹ tn Heb “in your own eyes” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV); NLT “Don’t be impressed with your own wisdom.”

[3:7]  ² sn The second colon clarifies the first. If one fears the Lord and turns away from evil, then he is depending on the Lord and not wise in his own eyes. There is a higher source of wisdom than human insight.

[16:6]  ³ sn These two words are often found together to form a nominal hendiadys: “faithful loyal love.” The couplet often characterize the Lord, but here in parallel to the fear of the Lord it refers to the faithfulness of the believer. Such faith and faithfulness bring atonement for sin.

[16:6]  ⁴ tn Heb “is atoned”; KJV “is purged”; NAB “is expiated.” The verb is from I כָּפַר (kafar, “to atone; to expiate; to pacify; to appease”; HALOT 493-94 s.v. I כפר). This root should not be confused with the identically spelled Homonym II כָּפַר (kafar, “to cover over”; HALOT 494 s.v. II *כפר). Atonement in the OT expiated sins, it did not merely cover them over (cf. NLT). C. H. Toy explains the meaning by saying it affirms that the divine anger against sin is turned away and man’s relation to God is as though he had not sinned (Proverbs [ICC], 322). Genuine repentance, demonstrated by loyalty and truthfulness, appeases the anger of God against one’s sin.

[16:6]  ⁵ tn Heb “fear of the Lord.” The term יְהוָה (yÿhvah, “the Lord”) functions as an objective genitive: “fearing the Lord.”

[16:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “turns away from”; NASB “keeps away from.”

[16:6]  ⁷ sn The Hebrew word translated “evil” (רַע, ra’) can in some contexts mean “calamity” or “disaster,” but here it seems more likely to mean “evil” in the sense of sin. Faithfulness to the Lord brings freedom from sin. The verse uses synonymous parallelism with a variant: One half speaks of atonement for sin because of the life of faith, and the other of avoidance of sin because of the fear of the Lord.

[16:17]  ⁸ sn The point of righteous living is made with the image of a highway, a raised and well-graded road (a hypocatastasis, implying a comparison between a highway and the right way of living).

[16:17]  ⁹ tn The form סוּר (sur) is a Qal infinitive; it indicates that a purpose of the righteous life is to turn away from evil. “Evil” here has the sense of sinful living. So the first line asserts that the well-cared-for life avoids sin.

[16:17]  ¹⁰ sn The second half of the verse uses two different words for “guard”; this one is נֹצֵר (notser) “the one who guards his way,” and the first is שֹׁמֵר (shomer) “the one who guards his life” (the order of the words is reversed in the translation). The second colon then explains further the first (synthetic parallelism), because to guard one’s way preserves life.

[16:17]  ¹¹ tc The LXX adds three lines after 17a and one after 17b: “The paths of life turn aside from evils, and the ways of righteousness are length of life; he who receives instruction will be prosperous, and he who regards reproofs will be made wise; he who guards his ways preserves his soul, and he who loves his life will spare his mouth.”

[28:28]  ¹² tc A number of medieval Hebrew manuscripts have YHWH (“Lord”); BHS has אֲדֹנָי (’adonay, “Lord”). As J. E. Hartley (Job [NICOT], 383) points out, this is the only occurrence of אֲדֹנָי (’adonay, “Lord”) in the book of Job, creating doubt for retaining it. Normally, YHWH is avoided in the book. “Fear of” (יִרְאַת, yir’at) is followed by שַׁדַּי (shadday, “Almighty”) in 6:14 – the only other occurrence of this term for “fear” in construct with a divine title.

[28:28]  ¹³ tc Many commentators delete this verse because (1) many read the divine name Yahweh (translated “Lord”) here, and (2) it is not consistent with the argument that precedes it. But as H. H. Rowley (Job [NCBC], 185) points out, there is inconsistency in this reasoning, for many of the critics have already said that this chapter is an interpolation. Following that line of thought, then, one would not expect it to conform to the rest of the book in this matter of the divine name. And concerning the second difficulty, the point of this chapter is that wisdom is beyond human comprehension and control. It belongs to God alone. So the conclusion that the fear of the Lord is wisdom is the necessary conclusion. Rowley concludes: “It is a pity to rob the poem of its climax and turn it into the expression of unrelieved agnosticism.”

[34:14]  ¹⁴ tn Or “do good.”

[34:14]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “seek peace and pursue it.”

[37:27]  ¹⁶ tn Or “Do good!” The imperatives are singular (see v. 1).

[37:27]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “and dwell permanently.” The imperative with vav (ו) is best taken here as a result clause after the preceding imperatives.

[37:2]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “like green vegetation.”

[2:1]  ¹⁹ sn Psalm 2. In this royal psalm the author asserts the special status of the divinely chosen Davidic king and warns the nations and their rulers to submit to the authority of God and his chosen vice-regent.

[2:1]  ²⁰ tn The question is rhetorical. Rather than seeking information, the psalmist expresses his outrage that the nations would have the audacity to rebel against God and his chosen king.

[2:1]  ²¹ tn The Hebrew verb רָגַשׁ (ragash) occurs only here. In Dan 6:6, 11, 15 the Aramaic cognate verb describes several officials acting as a group. A Hebrew nominal derivative is used in Ps 55:14 of a crowd of people in the temple.

[2:1]  ²² tn The interrogative לָמָּה (lamah, “why?”) is understood by ellipsis in the second line.

[2:1]  ²³ tn Or “peoples” (so many English versions).

[2:1]  ²⁴ tn The Hebrew imperfect form describes the rebellion as underway. The verb הָגָה (hagah), which means “to recite quietly, meditate,” here has the metonymic nuance “devise, plan, plot” (see Ps 38:12; Prov 24:2).

[2:1]  ²⁵ tn Heb “devising emptiness.” The noun רִיק (riq, “emptiness”) may characterize their behavior as “worthless, morally bankrupt” but more likely refers to the outcome of their plots (i.e., failure). As the rest of the psalm emphasizes, their rebellion will fail.