Discovery BoxProverbs 6:29
Context6:29 So it is with 1 the one who has sex with 2 his neighbor’s wife;
no one 3 who touches 4 her will escape 5 punishment. 6
Proverbs 21:9
Context21:9 It is better to live on a corner of the housetop 7
than in a house in company 8 with a quarrelsome wife. 9
Proverbs 25:24
Context25:24 It is better to live on a corner of the housetop
than in a house in company with a quarrelsome wife. 10
Proverbs 30:20
Context30:20 This is the way 11 of an adulterous 12 woman:
she eats and wipes her mouth 13
and says, “I have not done wrong.” 14
Proverbs 31:30
Context31:30 Charm is deceitful 15 and beauty is fleeting, 16
but a woman who fears the Lord 17 will be praised.
[6:29] 1 tn Heb “thus is the one.”
[6:29] 2 tn Heb “who goes in to” (so NAB, NASB). The Hebrew verb בּוֹא (bo’, “to go in; to enter”) is used throughout scripture as a euphemism for the act of sexual intercourse. Cf. NIV, NRSV, NLT “who sleeps with”; NCV “have sexual relations with.”
[6:29] 3 tn Heb “anyone who touches her will not.”
[6:29] 4 sn The verb “touches” is intended here to be a euphemism for illegal sexual contact (e.g., Gen 20:6).
[6:29] 5 tn Heb “will be exempt from”; NASB, NLT “will not go unpunished.”
[6:29] 6 tn The verb is יִנָּקֶה (yinnaqeh), the Niphal imperfect from נָקָה (naqah, “to be empty; to be clean”). From it we get the adjectives “clean,” “free from guilt,” “innocent.” The Niphal has the meanings (1) “to be cleaned out” (of a plundered city; e.g., Isa 3:26), (2) “to be clean; to be free from guilt; to be innocent” (Ps 19:14), (3) “to be free; to be exempt from punishment” [here], and (4) “to be free; to be exempt from obligation” (Gen 24:8).
[21:9] 7 tn English versions which translate the Hebrew term as “roof” here sometimes produce amusing images for modern readers: TEV “Better to live on the roof”; CEV “It’s better to stay outside on the roof of your house.”
[21:9] 8 tn The “house of company” has received numerous interpretations. The word “company” or “companionship” would qualify “house” as a place to be shared. The BHS editors propose “spacious house,” which would call for a transposition of letters (cf. NAB “a roomy house”; NLT “a lovely home”). Such an emendation makes good sense, but has no external support.
[21:9] 9 tn Heb “a wife of contentions”; KJV “a brawling woman”; TEV, CEV “a nagging wife.” The Greek version has no reference to a quarrelsome wife, but instead mentions justice in a common house.
[25:24] 13 tn This proverb is identical with 21:9; see the notes there.
[30:20] 19 sn Equally amazing is the insensitivity of the adulterous woman to the sin. The use of the word “way” clearly connects this and the preceding material. Its presence here also supports the interpretation of the final clause in v. 19 as referring to sexual intimacy. While that is a wonder of God’s creation, so is the way that human nature has distorted it and ruined it.
[30:20] 20 sn The word clearly indicates that the woman is married and unchaste; but the text describes her as amoral as much as immoral – she sees nothing wrong with what she does.
[30:20] 21 sn The acts of “eating” and “wiping her mouth” are euphemistic; they employ an implied comparison between the physical act of eating and wiping one’s mouth afterward on the one hand with sexual activity on the other hand (e.g., Prov 9:17).
[30:20] 22 sn This is the amazing part of the observation. It is one thing to sin, for everyone sins, but to dismiss the act of adultery so easily, as if it were no more significant than a meal, is incredibly brazen.
[31:30] 25 tn The first word of the twenty-first line begins with שׁ (shin), the twenty-first letter of the Hebrew alphabet. The graphic distinction between שׁ (shin) and שׂ (sin) had not been made at the time the book of Proverbs was written; that graphic distinction was introduced by the Masoretes, ca.
[31:30] 26 sn The verse shows that “charm” and “beauty” do not endure as do those qualities that the fear of the
[31:30] 27 sn This chapter describes the wise woman as fearing the
